Preserving a video from a phone?

[Pacific]

I have a very precious short video which is currently on my son's phone.

I would like to make a permanent DVD of this video and load it on to my main computer.

My computer does not have a video burner. Is there anywhere commercially that can make this DVD? And how can I load the video onto my computer?

I am not a computer geek but can usually manage easy stuff. I hope someone can help me.

TIA

If your phone has a USB cable then you should be able to plug the phone into the computer via the cable, then copy and paste the video in the same way that you would copy and paste any other file.

Alternatively if the phone has a micro SD card then you can get a little holder for it (looks like a normal SD card) and that plugs straight into the computer, again you can copy and paste it like any other file.

Can't think of any companies who would do the DVD service, my only thought is would you be able email the video to a friend who does have a DVD burner?

Thank you Bonfiery. I will try that.

Can you email from a phone? Son says you can't but I think either he can't be bothered trying or he doesn't want to admit he doesn't know how.

May depend on the size of the video clip. Bluetooth and USB (as well as removable memory cards) are the easiest ways - what model phone is it (as that may lead to an owner explaining best/easiest ways).

Unless it is 'massive' (over 600 MB) you can burn to a CD instead of a DVD. However, some mobiles store videos as .3GP (or somesuch - a neighbour had a video clip she wanted off her phone and I helped her to make it playable as a .AVI which can be played with lots of software and no longer tied to the s/w that comes with the mobile phone, or the mobile phone itself.

You could also open a Google Mail account and once the clip is on your computer, use GMail to 'send' it to someone (actually means you will upload the video clip to Google Mail) - just save it as a draft message and it will be available for you to download on some PC with a DVD burner, or just to know you have a copy of this previous clip.

Ooops - precious clip

Networg Guy.

thank you. It is a short clip, about 3 minutes.

DS says it is .3GP. I have no idea what that means.

Phone is a Nokia 5330

.3GP is a file type. Just as some photos are saved as .GIF or .JPG or .PNG (even if you didn't care) some movies are saved as .WMV (Windows Media Video I think), some as .MP3, and others as .MPG or .AVI, .3GP is a special format used by Nokia (and perhaps some others) and won't necessarily play directly on a regular PC without special software.

Just as one may find it difficult to find a VHS (or Betamax !) player for video tapes, it probably makes sense to get some software now to convert your video into a more popular format - .AVI or .MPG perhaps (.WMV needs a Windows Media player compatible application so in the future if you have an Apple computer at home, there may be a problem [or costly solution] if the file is left as either .3GP or .WMV).

Mmmmmmm, I'm a little at that nice phone he has...

Well, if you have a micro-SD card fitted, you can move that to a simple SD card reader for your main PC, and simply copy the file off.

The phone (I assume it is the Xpress Music model) is capable of taking micro-SD with up to 16 GB but for your purposes (and at lowest cost) a 2 GB micro-SD card would be better.

If you don't have one at home, then see if his USB cable and software allow easy transfer of data from the Nokia phone.

I have tried a number of different phones and some just don't seem to come with software to match the instructions, so please don't blame yourself if you have tried installing and each time get a problem where the phone isn't appearing like a removable device, and after a few goes, try bluetooth if you cannot transfer items via the USB cable.

If you have gone for the SD card option and have one, great, if not, I can recommend a firm I used on Ebay which sold the micro-SD card, plus adaptors for mini-SD and SD size cards (a modern PC is likely to have a built-in reader that can take SD cards, but the tiny size of the micro-SD makes them unsuitable for pushing into a large PC, hence the different adaptors. The holder in the phone will be pretty small, so take care to put the phone on a table or something with a large plain handkerchief or paper so you can spot the micro-SD card if it gets dropped.

If necessary I will find an image or take a photo of one so you can get an idea of how small it is.

I will ask my neighbour which software we ended up using to transfer her video file.

We spent a couple of hours downloading different (free) software and encountered strange error messages but did make the video suitable for her to put on a laptop and take to her G Guide meeting that evening (she was in a bit of a panic as it would only play on her main home machine as it had been created on a mobile).

Sorry, I did ask her but she has been away recently and working nights etc so have not seen her to speak to (just on her way out zooming away in her car).

Will check for software for you if you have not found anything suitable yet...

Sorry, hope you are still around Network Guy.

We tried everything we could think of and just couldn't get it straight on to the PC. Ended up putting it on Facebook which means I now have to open facebook account (humpf) having resisted so far.

Anyway, at least I can watch it now.

Thank you for your help

"and just couldn't get it straight on to the PC"

Do you mean you were unable to copy the file to your PC ? I just searched for .3GP to .AVI and found this ...

www.pazera-software.com/products/3gp-to-avi-converter/

now I am hunting for a .3GP file to convet !!

Hi network guy.

Have now managed to get it on to the PC.

We used a USB cable and transferred the video to realplayer. It saved on realplayer as 'MP4'. It wouldn't play at first but then by clicking 'convert to' I converted it to 'realvideo' and hey presto! it worked.

So now I have a facebook account I don't want......grrrr!

Thank you for your help. I would not have thought of using 'convert to' without you mentioning it. (smile)

I now want to e-mail it to my mum but when I click 'share' it says 'This file does not have a link to email'

Any ideas?!

If you go into your mail application (or web mail) and start to create a mail message to your Mum, most will have some option to "attach a file" (and might have a 'browse' button) so you can then find your video clip in the folder it is stored, and once you click 'Open' or 'OK´ the mail message can be sent.

Sometimes (eg web mail) the file is uploaded before you can click 'send' and if you are sending from your PC (eg with Thunderbird or MS Outlook Express) then there may be a delay while your anti-virus software checks the file.