I'm hoping I can get some help from you fine folks here on a weird issue that's coming up for this computer I'm working on.

Basically, when the iPhone is plugged into this Windows 7 laptop, it loads in iTunes just fine but it doesn't show up as an autoplay device in Windows. Is this normal? It seems that other people are able to get this to occur. Autoplay isn't the primary point, but rather the ability to easily remove the photos from the phone.

Any ideas?

Start here: http://support.apple.com/kb/TS1538

The iPhone shows up as multiple USB devices to a computer. Odds are, part of this is working (iTunes sees it), but not the other part to present it as a camera.

Also, do you have another camera to test with? Windows could also have an Autoplay problem in general.

You didn't say this in your post, but, have the system's autoplay settings been modified? (Control Panel, Auto Play.)

On my computer, the iPhone gets its own entry in that screen, see the attached screen shot. Is that set to something good, like "open folder to view files"?

Other things to think about:

When I first plug my iPhone into a computer, it prompts me to "trust this computer". Has the user said "No" to that question?

Have the necessary drivers and/or iTunes been reinstalled on this computer? I know that iTunes installs things like "apple mobile device service" and "itunes helper" applications. Sometimes I remove those to keep the system lightweight. Did that get done to this computer?

When plugging in the iPhone, does it show up as a Little Yellow Boo Boo Icon in the device manager?

Thanks, guys. Here's some responses:


Tom, unfortunately I've been to that site several times now...and it really doesn't say much other than "uninstall and reinstall."


Exactly, but I can't seem to find any information on how to get that camera part to install.


I'll ask if they have something they could plug in.


I spent quite a while on that screen. No, nothing has been altered on there. This is actually a brand new Windows 7 installation, only about two weeks old.


The "Devices" section remains completely empty when the iPhone is plugged in.


Do you mean on the computer or on the phone? If it's on the phone, how is that flag reset so I can get it to ask again? If it's on the computer, wouldn't uninstalling and reinstalling iTunes reset that flag?


Completely straightforward iTunes install, followed by a normal uninstall and a normal reinstall. Same situation.


That's one odd aspect to this. I don't believe I got the little yellow icon, but the device did show up in the "Unspecified Devices" section of "Devices and Printers" (image below, though I can't remember which of those two unspecified devices it shows up as - only one of those two). In Device Manager, the only entry for the iPhone is the Apple USB Mobile Device or whatever.

I've heard that for most people, when they plug in their iPhone it shows in the left-hand side of the explorer window and you can go in and browse the photos and videos (I guess it's using MTP or something?). That's the part I can't get to work, I guess...

Correct, the part you can't get to work is the part where the photos folder shows up as a camera drive in Windows Explorer. Attached are screen shots of what mine shows up like in Windows. I'm betting yours is missing something compared to these.



Don't know. Here are some suggestions:

https://discussions.apple.com/message/23705088#23705088

Any of those work?

Or does Heath J's suggestion here help?

https://discussions.apple.com/message/24540691#24540691

Unfortunately, his suggestion addresses a different problem. That driver he's pointing to is the one that re-enables the device to work in iTunes. At one point I tried uninstalling just that device in device manager, and was annoyed when I couldn't get it to reinstall. Even after reinstalling iTunes, it didn't work, so I had to go through the steps that Heath outlines. But that just got me back to where I started.

And that's one of the challenges of this thing. Researching a solution has been nearly impossible because everyone is miscommunicating about what their problem is and what they want to fix. You guys get it, but most of the other forums I've come across don't, and it's frustrating as hell! Argh.

Does Dropbox do its photo upload on the iPhone the same way it does on Android? It seems like that's the only way I'm going to get this person's photos/videos onto their computer...

The dropbox app on my iPhone does indeed seem to have a feature that allows it to auto-upload photos to dropbox. I don't personally use it but it looks like it'd do what you want.

iPhone's Dropbox upload does work well in my experience and (almost) the same as Android.

2 problems I'm aware of:
1) For large amounts of photos it is slow since it has to go up to the Dropbox cloud and back (not sure if the iPhone Dropbox app supports LAN syncing as a source but it still has to upload it either way before any other machines can see the files)

2) If the phone goes to sleep, it stops uploading (on Wifi at least) so you have to keep waking it up. iPhone takes more control over apps keeping it awake, screen on etc than Android.

Slow speeds for the syncing wouldn't be a problem except...


Wow, so you have to keep the phone screen on while the transfer is going? That...really sucks. I never even think about the Dropbox app on Android, I just let it do its thing. Well, this might be the only solution so there might not be much of a choice.

Not sure the screen has to be on exactly, but definitely when I had an iPhone 5 (pre iOS7 7) it would interrupt the uploads at some stage during the process of turning the screen off, locking etc. You'd get a notification about uploading being paused. Android does similar things but mainly (only?) when battery is low.

I don't have the iPhone any more so don't remember the exact mechanics, but it does happen. My wife's iPhone 5 does it with iOS7. I know she puts our kids photos in a special Dropbox folder for relatives to see and sometimes they don't upload until she has enough screen on time it seems.

Possibly if plugged into power/charging it might not stop the transfer?