Xiaomi, Redmi and POCO today store vast amounts of personal information, from work documents to family photo archives. Losing a device or breaking it can be a real blow if you don't take care of data in advance. Regularly backing up is not just a useful habit, but a necessity in the digital age.
In this article, we will take a look at all the ways you can transfer information from your gadget to your computer’s hard drive, and you will learn how to use official utilities from the manufacturer, third-party programs, and standard Android features to create complete clones of the system or selective archives of important files.
We will look at the nuances of working with the MIUI shell and HyperOS so that you can choose the most suitable method for your situation. Whether you need a full copy of the system for recovery after a reset or just export photos, here you will find proven solutions.
Preparation of a smartphone and a workplace
Before you start the copying procedure, you need to make sure that the equipment is ready to work. First of all, check the battery power of your device - it should be at least 50-60%. The process of creating a backup, especially a full one, can take a considerable time and require a lot of energy.
You will need quality. USB-cable, preferably original or certified by MFi. Cheap cables often only support charging and are unable to transmit data at high speeds, which will lead to errors in connection.
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Use it. USB-ports located directly on the motherboard (back of the system unit), rather than on the front panel or through hubs to ensure stable power and data transfer speeds.
On the device itself, you should activate USB debugging mode if you plan to use advanced copying methods. Go to Settings → About Phone and quickly click on MIUI Version seven times. Once the developer menu activation message appears, find it in the advanced settings.
Use of the official Mi PC Suite software
The official Mi PC Suite is one of the most reliable tools for working with the Chinese giant’s devices. Although support for some versions of the program has been discontinued, it still works effectively with many models to create full backups.
Once you install the software on your computer and connect your smartphone, you'll need to log in to your Mi Account, a security requirement that ensures that only the owner of the device has access to the data, and the interface will offer several options.
⚠️ Warning: When you first connect, you'll see a request for debugging permission on your smartphone screen. Be sure to confirm the action and check "Always Allow from this computer" so that the connection doesn't break.
The main feature we're interested in is called Backup, which allows you to select specific types of data: contacts, messages, call logs, notes and multimedia, and compresses information, which saves space on the disk.
Cloning through Mi Mover
Mi Mover was originally designed to transfer data to a new phone, but it also works well with the computer when set up properly, and it works well because it doesn’t require heavy drivers and works over Wi-Fi or through local networking.
To get started, run the app on your smartphone, which is usually pre-installed in the Tools folder. Select the device role: in this case, the phone acts as the sender, and the computer must receive the data. However, there is no direct transmission to the HDD, the data is first packaged in the archive.
- 📱 Run Mi Mover on your smartphone and select “I send».
- 💻 On your computer, create an access point or connect to the same Wi-Fi network as your phone.
- 🔗 Scan it. QR-code or enter a password to connect devices.
- 📂 Select files to transfer and wait for the process to be completed.
Once you've completed the transfer, you'll get an archive that can be moved anywhere on your computer, and it's convenient because it's cross-platform and doesn't depend on the version of Windows or macOS.
Why can't Mi Mover see the computer?
Manual copying of files through the Explorer
The easiest and most understandable way for most users is to drive mode. When connecting the cable, select the USB File Transfer or MTP mode from the smartphone notification menu. After that, the device will appear in My Computer as an external drive.
In this mode, you access the file system. The main data is in the DCIM (camera photos and videos), MIUI (screenshots, voice recorder, notes), Download (downloads) and Android (application data), and the copying is done by Drag-and-Drop.
| folder | Contents | Importance |
|---|---|---|
| DCIM/Camera | Photographs and videos | Critically. |
| MIUI/gallery | Albums and editing | Tall. |
| MIUI/sound_recorder | Audio recordings of the recorder | Medium |
| Bluetooth | Files received | Low. |
The main advantage of this method is that you have complete control over the process, and you can see what's being copied, and you can interrupt the process at any time, but you have to remember that you can't copy your system settings, your Wi-Fi passwords, or your icons on your desktop.
☑️ Checking before manual copying
Backup through ADB (for Advanced)
For users who want a full copy of the system with all the application data, Android Debug Bridge (ADB) is the perfect tool. It's a console utility from Google that allows you to control the device at a deep level. It requires pre-configuration, but gives the best result.
Once you install the platform tools on your PC and enable USB debugging on your phone, you can execute a backup command, which creates a single file image that contains folder structure and application data that is usually hidden from the user.
adb backup -apk -shared -all -system -f backup.abIntroduced instructs device to create backup.ab archive, including APK-application files, contents SD-Shared maps, all user applications and system data, and can take anywhere from 15 minutes to several hours depending on the amount of data.
⚠️ Warning: On the screen of the smartphone will be a request for confirmation of backup and a suggestion to set the password encryption. Do not leave the password field empty if the data is confidential, but do not forget it, otherwise it will be impossible to restore the backup.
Automation and cloud services
If manual copying seems too time-consuming, consider cloud storage, Mi Cloud provides 5GB of free space that can be expanded with a subscription, and automatically synchronizes contacts, gallery and notes.
For Windows 10 and 11 computers, there is a Windows Connection app that also integrates with the Android ecosystem, which allows you to see notifications, send messages, and access the latest photos without using cables.
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The combined approach (local copy on PC + cloud synchronization of critical data) provides maximum protection against loss of information.
Setting up an automatic upload of photos to Google Photos or Yandex.Disk is also a great addition to local copies. In the event of physical death of your computer hard drive, your photos will remain intact in the cloud.
Recovery of data from a copy
The recovery process depends on which copying method you used. If it was manual drag and drop, just return the files to the appropriate folders on the new or reset device. For contacts, use import from the.vcf file via the phone book menu.
When you use Mi PC Suite or Mi Mover, the procedure is reversed to create a copy. Select Restore, specify the path to the archive file, and confirm the action. The system will distribute the data to the desired cells.
To recover from ADB-The backup will need to be entered: adb restore backup.ab. The device will request the password you set when you created the copy and will begin the unpacking process.