Transferring files to Tablet via USB Cable Looses Original Time & Dates of Files

Hi,
I have a Samsung Android OS tablet with a SD card that I am unable to
remove ("stuck"). The alternative to putting files on that card is to connect
a USB cable, used for charging the tablet, into my Windows 7 Home Premium
laptop computer. Win7 detects the tablet, but does NOT assign a drive letter
to that device, as it does if I plugged in a SD card..

I can transfer files to my tablet's SD card this way, but their
original time and dates are replaced with the time and date of the
transfer!!!!

One solution for now, I "zip" up the files and transfer the FILE.ZIP
to my tablet's SD card (can't be removed), and use "X-plore", a file
manager, that can open the FILE.ZIP and allow me to view those
files and see their original time and dates.

I don't know if the tablet would "see" a USB flash drive if I
had the proper cable to connect it to the tablet?

Any suggestions?

Thank You in advance, John

wrote:
Hi,
I have a Samsung Android OS tablet with a SD card that I am unable to
remove ("stuck"). The alternative to putting files on that card is to connect
a USB cable, used for charging the tablet, into my Windows 7 Home Premium
laptop computer. Win7 detects the tablet, but does NOT assign a drive letter
to that device, as it does if I plugged in a SD card..

I can transfer files to my tablet's SD card this way, but their
original time and dates are replaced with the time and date of the
transfer!!!!

One solution for now, I "zip" up the files and transfer the FILE.ZIP
to my tablet's SD card (can't be removed), and use "X-plore", a file
manager, that can open the FILE.ZIP and allow me to view those
files and see their original time and dates.

I don't know if the tablet would "see" a USB flash drive if I
had the proper cable to connect it to the tablet?

Any suggestions?

Thank You in advance, John

There's an OTG adapter for some Galaxy Tab tablets. Note the female
USB on one end.

https://www.frys.com/product/7146712...H:MAIN_RSLT_PG

Since there is more than one model of Galaxy Tab, YMMV.
("plug holes" could be different).

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=199372

For a particular mobile device, you can look for an ifixit
takeapart article, and see how difficult disassembly is
(i.e. how much glue). Your SD card slot is probably one
of the newer "shallow" SDs, and might be subject to
easy mechanical failure. If the unit is easy to take
apart (unlikely), you could have another socket soldered
to the motherboard.

*******

Computer protocols vary as to what is "exposed" by them.
If an OS thinks it "owns" the thing it is talking to, the
date can be preserved. If not, the destination device
thinks it is "locally creating" the file out of thin air,
and todays date gets used in that case.

I've had cases before, where the dates on all the folders
on something get changed, while the file dates are preserved.
There are lots of little surprises when it comes to
date preservation, and the previous paragraph is only
a "general rule of thumb" and over the years, you'll
see a few cases that violate any known rules.

Paul

jaugustine wrote:

I have a Samsung Android OS tablet ...

I haven't delved into tablets but I'm pretty sure there is more than
just one model for one brand.

... with a SD card that I am unable to
remove ("stuck"). The alternative to putting files on that card is
to connect a USB cable, used for charging the tablet, into my
Windows 7 Home Premium laptop computer. Win7 detects the tablet, but
does NOT assign a drive letter to that device, as it does if I
plugged in a SD card..

I can transfer files to my tablet's SD card this way, but their
original time and dates are replaced with the time and date of the
transfer!!!!

One solution for now, I "zip" up the files and transfer the FILE.ZIP
to my tablet's SD card (can't be removed), and use "X-plore", a file
manager, that can open the FILE.ZIP and allow me to view those files
and see their original time and dates.

I don't know if the tablet would "see" a USB flash drive if I had the
proper cable to connect it to the tablet?

Probably not going to keep the original timestamps when using
Windows/File Explorer. When it creates a new file (the destination for
a copy operation), the timestamp will be when the file was created.

You can try using the command shell to do copy operations, like using
robocopy included in Windows. See:

https://superuser.com/a/1326224

Not sure how you are copying files from your PC to your tablet if
Windows on the PC is not assigned a drive letter to the tablet. How
are you going to transfer the .zip file from the PC to the tablet
without a drive letter for the tablet?

You sure the USB port in the tablet is configured for file transfer?
The setting in the tablet might restrict the USB port to just charging
or other limited use. In addition, in your tablet, you might have to
change from PTP to MTP for connection protocol.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picture_Transfer_Protocol
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_Transfer_Protocol

On Mon, 07 Jan 2019 07:34:44 -0500, wrote:

Hi,
I have a Samsung Android OS tablet with a SD card that I am unable to
remove ("stuck"). The alternative to putting files on that card is to connect
a USB cable, used for charging the tablet, into my Windows 7 Home Premium
laptop computer. Win7 detects the tablet, but does NOT assign a drive letter
to that device, as it does if I plugged in a SD card..

I can transfer files to my tablet's SD card this way, but their
original time and dates are replaced with the time and date of the
transfer!!!!

Have you looked at SafeCopy? It might do what you want.

--
croy

SNIP
Probably not going to keep the original timestamps when using
Windows/File Explorer. When it creates a new file (the destination for
a copy operation), the timestamp will be when the file was created.

You can try using the command shell to do copy operations, like using
robocopy included in Windows. See:

https://superuser.com/a/1326224

Not sure how you are copying files from your PC to your tablet if
Windows on the PC is not assigned a drive letter to the tablet. How
are you going to transfer the .zip file from the PC to the tablet
without a drive letter for the tablet?

The tablet is a Samsung Galaxy Tab A model : SM-T280.

The name of the device is displayed using Windows explorer, but
no drive letter. Therefore, I am not able to use the command,
"copy *.* E:" (copy all files at present location to the E: drive)

VERY IMPORTANT:

I forgot to mention that the first time I plugged this tablet, via
USB cable, into the Win7 laptop, Win7 searched for a driver,
but could NOT find a driver for the tablet.

I may search for a Windows 7 driver for this tablet, and that
might solve the problem?

You sure the USB port in the tablet is configured for file transfer?
The setting in the tablet might restrict the USB port to just charging
or other limited use. In addition, in your tablet, you might have to
change from PTP to MTP for connection protocol.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picture_Transfer_Protocol
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_Transfer_Protocol

BTW, I had to "Allow" access to the tablet (on the tablet) when
I first plugged it in.

John

wrote:
SNIP
Probably not going to keep the original timestamps when using
Windows/File Explorer. When it creates a new file (the destination for
a copy operation), the timestamp will be when the file was created.

You can try using the command shell to do copy operations, like using
robocopy included in Windows. See:

https://superuser.com/a/1326224

Not sure how you are copying files from your PC to your tablet if
Windows on the PC is not assigned a drive letter to the tablet. How
are you going to transfer the .zip file from the PC to the tablet
without a drive letter for the tablet?

The tablet is a Samsung Galaxy Tab A model : SM-T280.

The name of the device is displayed using Windows explorer, but
no drive letter. Therefore, I am not able to use the command,
"copy *.* E:" (copy all files at present location to the E: drive)

VERY IMPORTANT:

I forgot to mention that the first time I plugged this tablet, via
USB cable, into the Win7 laptop, Win7 searched for a driver,
but could NOT find a driver for the tablet.

I may search for a Windows 7 driver for this tablet, and that
might solve the problem?

You sure the USB port in the tablet is configured for file transfer?
The setting in the tablet might restrict the USB port to just charging
or other limited use. In addition, in your tablet, you might have to
change from PTP to MTP for connection protocol.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picture_Transfer_Protocol
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_Transfer_Protocol

BTW, I had to "Allow" access to the tablet (on the tablet) when
I first plugged it in.

John

They list a microUSB male to USB male (for plugin PC data or charging).

https://www.amazon.com/Charger-Samsu.../dp/B07FYGCD7R

But as to the MTP part, the samsung site is strangely moot.
(Moot in the sense that the site is totally irrelevant.)

They offer the usual squiddgy "modem driver", as if people sit around
pumping data via 115Kbit/sec honorable serial interface (tethered mode?).
The best part about the driver, is they use internal project names
which we don't know the mapping to model numbers.

They give instruction to "enable MTP" from tablet screen, but
that's about as helpful as they're going to get. They refuse to
use the words Windows (tm) or IBM (tm) PC. They make a reference
to "use genuine Samsung PC cable" or similar.

*******

AFAIK, MTP is a built-in on Windows 7.

On WinXP, MTP was bundled with a certain minimum version
of Windows Media Player. In the same way you might mix honey with
castor oil or something. The later version of Windows Media Player
messed with DRM somehow, as far as I can remember, so they
bundled the castor oil nobody wanted, with the WinXP MTP
driver people needed.

You may want to try setting the tablet to MTP mode first,
then plug in the cable to the Windows 7 computer. And see if
it's detected as MTP then.

Possible identifiers include the plug and play VEN/DEV,
as well as the USB class value. An official value exists
for MTP protocol.

Literally every source of information on this topic
is the "son of precision". No idea which Galaxy products
this might apply to. A galactic vacuum. By using dev values,
any initial driver confusion might be overcome, as the
new numeric value should trigger a new hardware discovery.

04e8 Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd
6860 Galaxy series, misc. (MTP mode)
6863 Galaxy series, misc. (tethering mode)
6865 Galaxy (PTP mode)
6866 Galaxy (debugging mode

You can watch with USBtreeview, after the tablet is flipped
to MTP mode, you've plugged in the cable (and Windows
has refused to deal with it).

https://www.uwe-sieber.de/usbtreeview_e.html

And people wonder why I don't own stuff like this :-/

Good luck,

Paul

*On 07/01/2019 12:34, wrote:**
*
*One solution for now, I "zip" up the files and transfer the FILE.ZIP
to my tablet's SD card (can't be removed), and use "X-plore", a file
manager, that can open the FILE.ZIP and allow me to view those files
and see their original time and dates.*
*
**Another solution is to eMail the zip file to yourself and download it
from the eMail on your target machine. Also, you could upload the file
to Microsoft OneDrive and use another machine to download the file.**
**
**Frankly, I don't understand why you guys are handicapped from doing
simple things like transferring a file from one system to another. You
need 5 pages of instructions to do this one simple task.**
**
**
**
**
*
*Any suggestions? *
*
**Given above if you can understand it. It is quite simple
actually!!!!!!!!!!!!!!**
**
*
**
*
**
*
*-- **
*
*With over 950 million devices now running Windows 10, customer
satisfaction is higher than any previous version of windows.*

On 07/01/2019 12:34, wrote:
Hi,
I have a Samsung Android OS tablet with a SD card that I am unable to
remove ("stuck").

Have you tried pressing the SD card *In* so that it unlatches and pops
out (a bit)?

On Tue, 8 Jan 2019 01:26:32 +0000, Patrick wrote:

On 07/01/2019 12:34, wrote:
Hi,
I have a Samsung Android OS tablet with a SD card that I am unable to
remove ("stuck").

Have you tried pressing the SD card *In* so that it unlatches and pops
out (a bit)?

My Wife's Samsung tablet has EXACTLY the same type of micro SD slot.
I have no problem removing the SD card from hers. I even contacted
Samsung tech support for a possible solution. I was told to do the
same procedure I had tried several times, the procedure you described,
but it does NOT work. Note: There is NO space to use a fine pair of
tweezers to pull it out after pushing it in.

UPDATE:

I downloaded a Windows USB driver for Samsung mobile phone
since I did NOT find one for a tablet. This time, when I plugged
the tablet in via USB cable connection, after I installed this driver, I saw a
message that a driver was found.

However, I STILL HAVE THE SAME PROBLEM. I may try Robo Copy
or other suggested Copy utility. Since there is NO drive letter assigned
to the tablet, I wonder if the Copy utility will "see" the device?
I'll report back later.

Also, I am going to buy a USB gender changer (male to female), if
available, so I can plug in a USB flash drive and find out if it can
be "seen" by a File Manager ap on the tablet.

Again, Thanks for your replies, John

jaugustine wrote:

SNIP
Probably not going to keep the original timestamps when using
Windows/File Explorer. When it creates a new file (the destination for
a copy operation), the timestamp will be when the file was created.

You can try using the command shell to do copy operations, like using
robocopy included in Windows. See:

https://superuser.com/a/1326224

Not sure how you are copying files from your PC to your tablet if
Windows on the PC is not assigned a drive letter to the tablet. How
are you going to transfer the .zip file from the PC to the tablet
without a drive letter for the tablet?

The tablet is a Samsung Galaxy Tab A model : SM-T280.

The name of the device is displayed using Windows explorer, but
no drive letter. Therefore, I am not able to use the command,
"copy *.* E:" (copy all files at present location to the E: drive)

VERY IMPORTANT:

I forgot to mention that the first time I plugged this tablet, via
USB cable, into the Win7 laptop, Win7 searched for a driver,
but could NOT find a driver for the tablet.

I may search for a Windows 7 driver for this tablet, and that
might solve the problem?

You sure the USB port in the tablet is configured for file transfer?
The setting in the tablet might restrict the USB port to just charging
or other limited use. In addition, in your tablet, you might have to
change from PTP to MTP for connection protocol.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picture_Transfer_Protocol
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_Transfer_Protocol

BTW, I had to "Allow" access to the tablet (on the tablet) when
I first plugged it in.

John

The USB mass storage class has been supported since Windows XP; however,
I suspect the device must use MTP, not PTP.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USB_ma...e_device_class

I also suspect the UMS support in Windows requires the storage on the
device to use a formatting that Windows supports, like FAT[32] or NTFS.
UMS works if, say, a USB flash drive is formatted as FAT or NTFS.
However, I'm guessing Google with its Unix-variant Android OS is using a
Linux storage format (e.g., ext3). That means the device needs to
provide a logical file system manager to communicate to the USB-attached
PC. Another problem is that Google stopped presenting the USB-attached
phone as a USB mass storage device in Android 4 (Google dropped USBMS in
Android 4). Windows does not see MTP devices as mass storage devices.

I have seen where USB devices do not get a drive letter assigned. I
some cases, it was incomplete presentation data sent by the USB device
to Windows. In some cases, the enumeration data stored in the Windows
registry got corrupted and I had to delete it and reconnect the USB
device to renogiate to obtain its presentation data again. You might be
able to go into Device Manager (devmgmt.msc) to see if the USB device is
listed (but without a drive letter). Right-click on the USB device and
assign it a drive letter.

Still don't know how you have USB setup for which mode on your tablet.
See:

https://support.google.com/android/answer/9064445?hl=en

Did you configure your tablet to enable file transfer over its USB port?

Also don't know if you picked a default action in the AutoPlay wizard
for the USB device (tablet) when Windows detected it. In Control Panel
- AutoPlay, is your tablet listed under the Devices section? For some
reason, Microsoft decided upon install of OneDrive (or perhaps as an
option in OneDrive that I did not realize the consequences) to assign
"Import photos and videos to OneDrive" when I plug in my smartphone via
USB. I had to change the default action to "Ask me everytime" so I
could decide what to do when I connected my smartphone to my PC.

Apparently the MTP protocol does not do much other than identify the
device to the OS for media control. It does not enforce a drive letter
assignment. While this is a limitation in the Windows Explorer, other
file managers are more robust. I've read where some have use the Total
Commander file manager: in Explorer, right-click on the MTP device and
created a shortcut, and use the shortcut in Total Commander to explore
the MTP device. There are other similar remoting software for Android
devices but I only used AirDroid (see below).

Another suggestion was to install an FTP, WebDAV, or other file server
app on the phone/tablet and connect to it with a matching client on the
PC to transfer files to/from the device. One setup had the user install
an FTP server on their phone and use FTPuse on their PC to map a remote
share (FTP server) as a local drive on the PC.

Rather than use an all-3rd party setup, one user suggested using a
WebDAV server on the phone, like:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/d...avserver&hl=en
(I have no experience with this app.)

The WebDav server will listen on an IP address and port (which you have
to know). Under Windows, you use "Map Network Drive", enter the IP
address and port for the WebDAV server on the phone, and a drive letter
gets assigned to that mapped share. This is how mapped drives work.

You could enable Developer Options in the tablet and then in dev options
enable the Debug Mode. I remember back when I used AirDroid (their
desktop client on the PC) that it required USB Debug Mode (under Deve
Options) to remotely controll my smartphone, and it let me see all the
files on my smartphone. Later AirDroid came out with a web client that
can access your smartphone, so you could use their desktop client on
your PC or their web client from anywhere you can use a web browser.

https://www.google.com/search?q=Sams...T28+debug+mode

Then install the ADB (Android Debug Bridge) driver in Windows (to
communicate with the tablet from Windows). As for Samsung's ADB driver,
I found:

https://developer.samsung.com/galaxy...er-for-windows

I haven't connected my smartphone to my PC via USB cable in a long time.
On the phone, I have both OneDrive and Google Drive (the latter is
bundled with Android) which can sync files to my online account. On my
PC, I have the OneDrive and Google Drive (renamed to Google Backup and
Sync) which syncs to my online account. In effect, I'm using the cloud
to sync my files between my phone and PC.

wrote:
Hi,
I have a Samsung Android OS tablet with a SD card that I am unable to
remove ("stuck"). The alternative to putting files on that card is to connect
a USB cable, used for charging the tablet, into my Windows 7 Home Premium
laptop computer. Win7 detects the tablet, but does NOT assign a drive letter
to that device, as it does if I plugged in a SD card..

I have two Samsung tablets and neither supports "USB mass storage"
mode (which is the mode needed to show the Android device as drive
letters on a Windows system).

You will find that most modern Android devices do not support "USB
mass storage" mode, because the - possibility of - simultaneous access
by both the Android device and the computer nearly always leads to
corruption of the SD-card.

Most modern Android devices will offer only MTP and PTP mode (see
VanguardLH's responses on those modes).

I can transfer files to my tablet's SD card this way, but their
original time and dates are replaced with the time and date of the
transfer!!!!

One solution for now, I "zip" up the files and transfer the FILE.ZIP
to my tablet's SD card (can't be removed), and use "X-plore", a file
manager, that can open the FILE.ZIP and allow me to view those
files and see their original time and dates.

I don't know if the tablet would "see" a USB flash drive if I
had the proper cable to connect it to the tablet?

Any suggestions?

Thank You in advance, John

You can try MyPhoneExplorer [1] which is an Android/Windows combo which
can use an USB or WiFi connection.

Since it's a Samsung tablet, you could also use Samsung's 'Kies 3'
software, but all references to that seems to have vanished from the
Samsung site, in favour of the Smart Switch software. The Smart Switch
page [2] still mentions 'Kies', but the 'LEARN MORE' link [3] redirects
back to the Smart Switch page! Sigh!

I don't know if any of these preserve timestamps when copying, but
it's worth a try. My advice is to start with MyPhoneExplorer.

[1]
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.fjsoft.myphoneexplorer.client
and
https://www.fjsoft.at/en

[2] https://www.samsung.com/us/smart-switch

[3] http://www.samsung.com/us/support/owners/app/kies

SNIP
You can try MyPhoneExplorer [1] which is an Android/Windows combo which
can use an USB or WiFi connection.

Since it's a Samsung tablet, you could also use Samsung's 'Kies 3'
software, but all references to that seems to have vanished from the
Samsung site, in favour of the Smart Switch software. The Smart Switch
page [2] still mentions 'Kies', but the 'LEARN MORE' link [3] redirects
back to the Smart Switch page! Sigh!

I don't know if any of these preserve timestamps when copying, but
it's worth a try. My advice is to start with MyPhoneExplorer.

[1]
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.fjsoft.myphoneexplorer.client
and
https://www.fjsoft.at/en

[2] https://www.samsung.com/us/smart-switch

[3] http://www.samsung.com/us/support/owners/app/kies

Hi, I ordered a USB gender changer from Amazon. I heard from a ham radio
friend of mine that he was able to access a USB flash drive using his tablet
with the proper cable. That should solve my problem.

John

*On 09/01/2019 12:37, wrote:**
*
*That should solve my problem. John *
*
**Good. Now **** off from here. You are too stupid to do anything
yourself.**
**
**
*
*-- **
*
*With over 950 million devices now running Windows 10, customer
satisfaction is higher than any previous version of windows.*

wrote:

SNIP
You can try MyPhoneExplorer [1] which is an Android/Windows combo which
can use an USB or WiFi connection.

Since it's a Samsung tablet, you could also use Samsung's 'Kies 3'
software, but all references to that seems to have vanished from the
Samsung site, in favour of the Smart Switch software. The Smart Switch
page [2] still mentions 'Kies', but the 'LEARN MORE' link [3] redirects
back to the Smart Switch page! Sigh!

I don't know if any of these preserve timestamps when copying, but
it's worth a try. My advice is to start with MyPhoneExplorer.

[1]
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.fjsoft.myphoneexplorer.client
and
https://www.fjsoft.at/en

[2] https://www.samsung.com/us/smart-switch

[3] http://www.samsung.com/us/support/owners/app/kies

Hi, I ordered a USB gender changer from Amazon. I heard from a ham radio
friend of mine that he was able to access a USB flash drive using his tablet
with the proper cable. That should solve my problem.

John

Whether it does or not, come on back to post the result. We're curious.

On 8 Jan 2019 18:47:02 GMT, Frank Slootweg
You can try MyPhoneExplorer [1] which is an Android/Windows combo which
can use an USB or WiFi connection. [snip]
My advice is to start with MyPhoneExplorer.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.fjsoft.myphoneexplorer.client

Many thanks for this tip, Frank. These two apps make synching
over Wi-Fi easy and fast. Both a phone client and a Windows
desktop client are required, the latter being available from
fosshub.com. The interface is a bit fiddly but once the tasks
are set up and saved, two clicks are all that is needed to update
a folder and its subfolders on the SD card. I spent a lot of
time looking for an easy and reliable way to do this and this is
it!