How can I sync my ENTIRE icloud to a Windows 10 PC? The included articles seem inaccurate and incomplete
This article describes the process of setting up icloud on a Windows machine among other things
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT205323
However, iCloud doesn't actually sync to the machine like every other cloud service in the world. What seems to happen is only new additions to the iCloud are synced. There are instructions which purport to tell how to get the older files down, but they do not work. From that article:
Download your photos and videos from iCloud Photos
New photos and videos you add to iCloud Photos will automatically download to your PC. You can also download your collection by year when you follow these steps:
- Open a File Explorer window.
- Under Favorites, click iCloud Photos.
- Click Download photos and videos.
- Choose the photos and videos you want to download and click Download.
Your photos and videos download to the location you set in iCloud Photos Options.
The File Explorer only shows me local files. I can click on the icons referred to and that takes me to a local directory to which iCloud photos have been downloaded, but that's it. There's no "Download Photos and Videos" option or icon I can see to click on - I'm not even sure where that option would even be if it was there.
In general I really don't feel like I have a lot of control over file storage under the Apple regime, whether locally on my iPhone, with iCloud, or in sharing with other devices. It seems like I can't really choose where to store files or easily move them around. Instead of just letting me copy files from IOS devices to a PC or the like, iCloud is apparently the way, but there are so many ways in which it is more clunky than other cloud services. And there is some business I am reading about the files not actually being copied as they are, but "converted" in some way - why can't I just copy my files around for crying out loud?
And I can't use my iPhone's storage efficiently, either, because even though I am supposed to have 250GB of space there everything has to be constrained to a 5GB iCloud. Until I figure that out I want to at least get some of the stuff off to my PC where I have some storage. But meanwhile it would be nice to see my iCloud actually syncing since that is supposed to be the point of cloud storage services.
iPhone 8