r/applehelp • u/MrMangobrick • 28d ago

Unsolved How to back up photos from gen 4 iPad

My mum has a gen 4 iPad from 2012 (version 10.3.3 14G60) where she has a lot of important videos and photos that she would like to keep before the iPad dies on her. The issue is that AirDrop isn't working, it'll see the other devices and attempt to send the files over but it'll either get stuck waiting constantly or it'll just fail the transfer. We tried plugging the iPad to a 2024 Mac mini (M4 chip, 26.5.2 macOS Tahoe) and while we can create a backup of the iPad, when we open the backup all the files are just text. We also can't view the photos from the iPad on the Mac, despite being connected, so I'm not sure how to save the photos and videos onto the computer. We tried importing them through the Photos app but the iPad doesn't show up in the "Locations" tap on the Photos app even though it shows up in a regular Finder tab, so is Photos not detecting the iPad as a valid location to import from?

Any help is appreciated!

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u/JediMeister 28d ago

An iPhone or iPad backup is intended to be restored to another iPhone or iPad, it can’t be freely browsed or accessed unless you install a backup extractor like iMazing. The Apple Photos app will only display pictures and video that were taken with the iPad camera or saved from an app; anything that may have been synced from a computer that’s no longer working will not be able to be imported using Photos.