All Pictures from Nokia N70 to Mac in seconds

Written on July 26, 2006 – 1:40 am | by Ash |

OS X’s built in bluetooth file exchange utility seems to have been giving Nokia N70 users quite a bit of grief. In fact browsing the Nokia N70 from OS X is next to impossible. The only way to get your pictures across to your Mac so far has been by transferring them one at a time, which can be a painstakingly time consuming task.

There is however a work around that will let you transfer all of your pictures in one go.

Video after the jump.


The mark/unmark of files may also be done within the Gallery on the N70 if you find this easier. But using the File Manager will work for transferring any files, not just photos.

This trick may well work for other Symbian based phones but this hasn’t been tested. If you get your transfers done this way on a phone other than the Nokia N70, please let us know in the comments.

  1. 29 Responses to “All Pictures from Nokia N70 to Mac in seconds”

  2. By Jim on Aug 3, 2006 | Reply

    I haven’t had a chance to try it, but it looks like this will work for my old Nokia 3660 phone as well. I checked and it has the “Mark All” option… I never knew about it because you have to scroll down (with the down arrow key) to see the menu item.

    Thanks for the tip. I don’t use the phone any more, but at least I’ll be able to grab all of the pictures off of it. :)

    I now have a Sony Ericsson z520a which is very Mac OS X friendly, and you can transfer files easily using the “Browse Device” option from Apple’s bluetooth menu.

  3. By Ash on Aug 3, 2006 | Reply

    Yes, it looks like something is not quite up to bluetooth standards on Nokia’s side as Henrik points out on the Apple Discussion Forums.

  4. By Ash on Aug 3, 2006 | Reply

    Since most of you reading this post probably have a bluetooth enabled phone and mac, I thought it may be worth mentioning this: If you are are on a bluetooth enabled mac without the new apple remote, you can use your bluetooth phone as a remote for iTunes, Keynote, VLC Player, etc… using Salling Clicker.

    And Jim, Salling Clicker supports your z520a as a remote!

  5. By anina.net on Sep 2, 2006 | Reply

    i am sounding the alarm in nokia about this issue please can you digg it?

    http://anina.typepad.com/anina/2006/09/apple_and_nokia_1.html

    https://blogs.forum.nokia.com/view_entry.html?id=182

  6. By Bill on Nov 1, 2006 | Reply

    Hi!. :)
    I’ve used N70 for almost a year and just got a N73 few days ago .Haven’t had this problem however I have 2 batteries and use a desktop charger so therefore the charger is always plugged into the desktop charger.

    maybe invest on a desktop charger?

    Thanks ;)

  7. By simon dukes on Nov 16, 2006 | Reply

    you are a star !
    i’ve been tryin to do this for ages.
    cheers.

  8. By Scott Voorhees on Jan 22, 2007 | Reply

    Many thanks! It would be nice if apple had posted help like this - or even linked to you - given that I bought the phone because it was iSync ready, but nowhere is there anything written about what to do with the photos… Not helpful either that Nokia seems to ignore mac users. Thanks again, the video was excellent.

  9. By Bec on Feb 18, 2007 | Reply

    Thanks very much that was v helpful

  10. By Tim Hardy on Feb 27, 2007 | Reply

    You’ve just saved me a lot of hassle. Thanks very much for the detailed information.

  11. By Sudheer on Mar 7, 2007 | Reply

    Thank you very much for this work around procedure. Indeed this helped me transfer images files from N70 mobile to my Apple PowerBook.

  12. By felix_da_cat on Mar 12, 2007 | Reply

    hey thank you for this great tip. I was looking for a solution a long time ago, and searched several forums… but everyone just want to sync calender datas with a N70. but finaly a good short howto sync all photos! tanks a lot!

  13. By matti on Mar 19, 2007 | Reply

    Thanks a thousand!!!

  14. By digger on Mar 29, 2007 | Reply

    what a great piece of advice … this has been bugging me for ages … 100 images downloading as I type … many thanks

  15. By michael on Apr 12, 2007 | Reply

    fantastic. this has been irking me since i got the phone. emailed nokia on various occasions with no reply, but this will do the trick nicely! thanks

  16. By Aj on Apr 16, 2007 | Reply

    Thanks for this tip as i have n93,n90,n91,3 days ago n70 for portability.now the real reason im posting here is to tell you folks not to write,say,anything to nokia or apple about this. If they hear it enough one of the two co.s’ will inturn do just the opposite of what we want.thus,.make the syc completely impossible.think about it…all this time of this incompatability and nothing has gotten easier for mac users.p.c this p.c that. for me since the nok 6600[ which loved my i book and visa versa] ive found no easy way to sync my powebook to n series anything !perhaps its more nokias symbian thats the real issue as it has advanced . In addition ,the n70 is only n series device w/older symbian version.as this trick isnt jiving for me on other devices.

  17. By Ahmadaly Fazal on Apr 17, 2007 | Reply

    yes, you are right. i cannot browse the phone or transfer pics using my mac bluetooth. the only way is to use the select all or individually.

    have you found a solution yet??? pls let me know as it will make life a little easy.

    thanks

  18. By renee Gross on Apr 28, 2007 | Reply

    THAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANK YOU!
    Such an easy way to transfer the files… and in like 2 simple steps… NO KIDDING! Thanks so much!

  19. By ajd on Jun 11, 2007 | Reply

    I’ve owned a N70 for a year now and I’ve come to the conclusion that nokia are vastly overrated. Even if you ignore the fact that they’ve crippled file transfer over bluetooth and ignore the fact that S60 doesn’t support the AT commands (ever wondered why the N70 can’t send sms messages via address book?) even if you ignore both of those glaring problems the fact is I’ve never had a phone reset itself so often on me. It’s buggy and slow and I haven’t found a replacement calendar that comes close to matching the one on the Samsung D500.

    I can help solve two problems with this crap phone though.

    http://www.martin.st/software/s60-obexftp/

    Read and be amazed at what Nokia have done. The SDP Browser and editor work though so thanks to Martin you can see two drives if you have a memory card installed. This will allow you to upload and download files as you should have been able to all along.

    http://www.piaccess.com/trac/wiki/Products/Link

    Again, by having to resort to a 3rd party piece of software you too can have functionality that should have been there in the first place. Using this (I intend to buy it now) you can use the Address Book to send sms messages.

    None of this seems to be Apples fault in the slightest. All hail Nokia - makers of sub-standard phones!

  20. By charz on Jun 11, 2007 | Reply

    hi, ur a legend, tyvvvvm! x

  21. By Kirsten on Jul 29, 2007 | Reply

    Indeed … you’re a legend on this one!

  22. By grant on Sep 8, 2007 | Reply

    your a champ. it worked first up. nokia should pay your rent forever..

  23. By Mihail on Sep 17, 2007 | Reply

    How the bluetooth file transfer works with Nokia 6165i(if it works)? I was able to easily pair the phone with my powerbook, transfer the file from PowerBook to the phone, got the finish “vibration” but I can’t see it anywhere on the phone?? Is a ringtone file bought from ITunes. Thanks, Mihail

    Mihail,

    I am not familiar with the 6165i but when you transfer a file to the Nokia N70 via bluetooth, it shows up as a new SMS message with an attachment. When you then open the message, it will allow you to view it and save it to your gallery (if it’s a picture).

    The fact that you are getting the vibration after the transfer is an indication that the file has definitely been sent to your phone. If it doesn’t show up in your inbox, I’d suggest trying to open your photo gallery/my albums in case your phone has automatically put it there. (Menu > Pictures > My Albums > My Pictures).

    As for the ringtone, if it’s a ringtone that you purchased through iTunes, it will only work with an iPhone (it’s protected with http://http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_rights_management“> DRM). If it’s a track that you’ve ripped off a CD into iTunes however, all you need to do is send the file across to your phone via bluetooth and you should be able to select it as a ringtone.

    Hope this helps!

    Ash

  24. By RushRutin on Feb 19, 2008 | Reply

    Update for Leopard. In Leopard Bluetooth Sharing is located under the General Sharing Preferences set and not under the Bluetooth Preferences as shown in the podcast here-above.

  25. By jo on Feb 20, 2008 | Reply

    i have just purchased my very first MAC and I cannot get any photos sent to it via bluetooth from my N70 Nokia phone. I can pair my MAC to phone, but each time i try to send an image (one by one)i receive a ’sending failed’ on my phone. I have tried the ‘unmark, mark’ all photos thing and still nothing happens! so frusting, please someone help me!

  26. By Ash on Feb 20, 2008 | Reply

    Jo,

    Congratulations on purchasing your first Mac! About sending images to your Mac over bluetooth, you need to make sure that ‘Bluetooth File Sharing’ is enabled. This is disabled by default in Mac OS X Leopard.

    Load up ‘System Preferences’, then ‘Sharing’ (Under ‘Internet & Network’) and make sure there is a check in the ‘Bluetooth Sharing’ box.

    Hope this works for you!

  27. By jo on Feb 22, 2008 | Reply

    Ash, you are amazing! It worked! I was secretly giving up on mac and regretting my purchase, but thanks to you, i love my mac again :)

    Thank you, thank you, thank you,
    Jo

  28. By Remco on Apr 8, 2008 | Reply

    Great post! thanks for helping us out.

    ps. too bad all the files are stored in folders, have to do each one seperately. but still better than every file on it’s own!

  29. By thiago on May 17, 2008 | Reply

    man really thanks for that, i was almost installing xp!!

  30. By Miles on Jul 5, 2008 | Reply

    Thank you very very much for this excellent work around and superb video tutorial - my father and I have spent three days trying to transfer things with no success - this did it first time! Thank you very much.

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