Are my iPhone photos recoverable?
Asked by
mothacid (
54
)
September 28th, 2015
Here’s the situation. I got my new iPhone 6s Plus Friday night. Prior to that I backed up my iPhone 6 onto iTunes. The next morning I took my new phone to work to shoot pictures for an event. I was so tired and went straight to watching my son by myself afterwork but also had other tasks to do. I woke up from a nap and went directly to “restore” my new phone with the data I backed up with iTunes previously on the iPhone 6 but before I restored phone I “updated carrier settings” whatever that was (I think it was iOS 9.0.1)
When I hooked my new phone up to iTunes it gave me options of which date to restore from I selected [iPhone3] which was the identity of my iPhone 6.
I don’t know why but I assumed my texts messages and photos would just be added along once I ‘restored’ what a fool I am! So I lost my text message contacts that I made that day as well as the photos and videos I took that day. Again let me reiterate I didn’t manually “delete” photos so there is no “Recently Deleted Photos” with the stuff I’m looking for.
Any advice how to get them back?
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3 Answers
The question for you to figure out is: how did you have your phone set up when you started using it out of teh box? If set to back up to the iCloud, the data may be recoverable.
So what you did is wiped the phone and copied the old phone on to it? If you’re lucky the new phone might have backed up the new phone to iCloud before you copied the info from the old phone on top of it (if I remember correctly) this is the default for iPhones assuming you linked an iCloud account to it. The backup happens automatically when it’s plugged in and connected to wifi. So assuming you put tour iCloud details in and left it plugged in before you restored it there’s a chance you have a backup.
Apple’s method of backing up is quirky enough that there really is no way of telling.
Whenever I deal with an iDevice though, I pretty much assume that the device will be wiped and overwritten every time I plug it in, regardless of the settings on the device or iTunes. That assumption is based on experience (and plenty of lost data). They have no conventional file structure, nor do they have removable SD card storage, so it’s a bit trickier to get them to behave in a predictable manner as opposed to being totally at the whim of iCloud and iTunes.
Given that you are dealing with a device that actively shuns normal techniques used with technology, your best bet will likely be to utilize the one thing that Apple undeniably does correctly and well; their customer service. Their “geniuses” are more well-versed in how to navigate their top secret “walled garden” environment than those not ordained by Apple while trying any of the tricks that would work on a less proprietary device likely won’t work.
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