Thanks to an Amazon store credit, I decided to upgrade my Google Nexus One. The Android handset includes a 4GB microSD memory card, but I want to carry more more media on the device. I ended up purchasing a Class 6 microSD card with 16 GB of storage capacity and it arrived yesterday. Last night, I sat down to swap the memory cards when I realized how little I actually connect the phone to a computer — in other words, my data is out of sync between devices.
So some of my music is on my phone, while most is on a computer. And in cases where I bought music right from the phone, that music is only on the phone and not in my centralized music repository. The same holds true with videos and photos that I’ve taken on the Nexus One — most of that media is only on the phone. If I wanted to share any of those pics, I’ve already done so through Facebook, Flickr or Twitter. But I don’t want to lose any of this information and it’s all on the 4 GB microSD card. I could simply copy the entire contents of the 4 GB card to a computer and copy it all back to the 16 GB card, but I really only want my media files.
There are many ways to resolve this issue and it’s common to a theme I keep hearing — new smartphone users with an Android device don’t always know how to get media to or from their phone. It’s actually quite easy to do and doesn’t even require any software, but going the native route could be tricky — if you mount or connect the phone and use a file explorer application, you’ll likely see far more information than you need to. That’s why I fired up doubleTwist in this situation — it’s free, it works great and it’s what I’m already using to manage music with my Android device. Here’s how to migrate media files from an old microSD card to a new one:
- First, you’ll need a copy of doubleTwist installed on your Mac or Windows computer. That’s easy enough to find right here.
- Once doubleTwist is installed and running, just connect your Android phone to the computer with the USB cable that came with the phone.
- DoubleTwist helps you “mount” your phone, which is a fancy way of saying that your computer has access to the microSD card. Here’s the dialog box that walks you though the simple process with an Android device.

- Once the phone is mounted, you’ll see it in the left side of doubleTwist under Devices and under the device, you’ll see clickable options for Music, Videos and Movies. Tap any of these options and doubleTwist will read the microSD card in your phone. The results will show you exactly what media files are on the old microSD card. Here are some screen shots of pictures and a video that reside on the old microSD card and not on my computer — if I simply swap memory cards, I won’t have these on my phone any longer.


- So here’s where doubleTwist really helps — the software doesn’t just get media from a computer to your phone; it also can move media from your phone to a computer. I’ll walk through the steps for music to illustrate, as the process is essentially the same for each media type.
- Here I’ve searched for the latest Patty Griffin album I bought directly on my phone with the Amazon MP3 application. I have the album on the old 4 GB microSD card, but not on my computer.

I simply selected all of the songs and dragged them to the Music icon under Library, which represents the computer’s music library. doubleTwist copies the music files from the microSD card right to the computer. Note that they’re not deleted from the old microSD card — they’re simply copied over to my main music library on a computer. And they actually won’t appear in your computer’s iTunes library either — instead, when you click the Music icon under Library, you’ll see a doubletTwist folder within the music sources, like this:
Yup, it sounds confusing, but in reality, it’s not so bad. The program has simply copied music from the phone to a folder on the computer. You need the music on the computer so you can move it back to the phone once it contains the new microSD card. - The same process applies to Photos or Movies taken with an Android device. Just tap Photos under your device name to see the pictures you’ve captured using your phone’s camera. Drag any or all of them to the Photos section under the Library and doubleTwist will copy the images to your computer. Repeat the process for any videos using the Movies icons.
Once you’ve moved all music, image and video files from the phone to the computer, you can physically swap the microSD cards. First, you’ll need to un-mount your phone — simply click the little eject icon next to the name of your phone in doubleTwist to start the process. Once you’ve done that step, the process is finished on your Android phone. Pull down the status bar and tap the option to “Turn off USB storage.” Android will prompt you to confirm — simply tap “Turn Off” and you can then unplug your handset from the computer.- At this point, you have a computer copy of the media currently on your microSD card. Now you can physically swap the current memory card with the new one. In my case, with the Nexus One, I powered down the phone and removed the back cover. I removed the battery and then pulled out the 4 GB memory card that came with the phone. The new 16 GB card went in, as did the battery. I then replaced the phone cover and powered up the handset with the new, blank memory card inside.
- Once my phone restarted, I received a warning that the memory card was unformatted. If you see the same, simply go to Settings, SD Card & Phone Storage from the main screen. Note that this exact menu option could vary based on your phone’s version of Android. You should see an option to Format the SD card — if it’s not an available option, just tap the Unmount SD Card item first. Then follow the prompts to format the new card and once Android completes the formatting, you’re ready to move media over to the new card.
- To get media back, just plug the phone back into your computer, hit up the doubleTwist app again and follow the mounting instructions on your phone. This time, you’ll be dragging media files from the Library to your device. Or if you want to keep it simple from a music perspective, just click your device name in doubleTwist and configure the application to either sync all of your music or just your selected playlists of tunes.

Now that I have four times the storage capacity, I did exactly that and then transferred back the photos and video I wanted on my handset.
Again, there are plenty of ways to migrate data from one memory card to another. And if I was already synchronizing my phone with a computer on a regular basis, I wouldn’t have to manually move the files back and forth. But the approach I’ve outlined focuses on the occasional or lack of media sync activities and leverages a free piece of useful software that I’m already using to manage my music library. iTunes is a great solution for many people in that regard, but it can only be used with Apple products. DoubleTwist works with hundreds of phones, so I’ve adopted it for my media management. Here’s a short video showing the basics offered by doubleTwist.
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