I have much frustration. I don't get this stuff, so forgive any idiotic questions. Basically, I inherit second hand iPhones. Phones don't matter to me - I use them to make calls, text and take photos/vids. Rarely use apps so scoring freebie phones is pretty sweet.. even if they are the bane of my existence: Apple. Ie. things I just don't understand.
My situation is pretty simple.
- Got iPhone 5 32GB, storage is full on phone.
- Have bought iCloud storage: 200GB (167GB free currently)
- Photo Stream auto updates/uploads onto my laptop using wifi
- Phone auto backs up using iCloud.. I think? Whatever. It backs up. Somehow. Magically. Apple Magic.
I don't use iTunes. hate it.
NOW: I want to free up storage on my phone but don't want to go on a deleting spree only to have it all sync-delete off iCloud. My brain hasn't wrapped around the whole concept of how all these things are linked together and related.
ALSO. I note that only my photos are copied onto my computer from Photo Stream. Not videos. Are my videos backed up to iCloud?? (I definitely have the camera roll selected as part of that iCloud backup thingyoption).
I just want to make sure my photos AND videos are backed up safely and won't be deleted if I clear data off my phone. Super precious memories on here which I can't risk losing (as all photos/videos are) :)
Thanks for any help in advance. Apologies again for the immense naivety of my questions. I've been living under a rock tech-wise.
P.S. is it also worth doing a manual copy/paste sorta back-up of the Camera Roll folders (after accessing the iPhone like a USB device on a PC - not via iTunes) onto an external hard drive as an extra back up?
I never back anything up ever. Very noob here.
you should be able to do a manual copy paste very much like you just described. Just plug in the iPhone to the PC, open up my computer and double click on your iPhone. There should be a DCIM folder which has all your photos and videos inside which you can copy and paste to an external hard drive.