There are many applications that can be used to transfer files to and from an iPhone or an iPod. However upon searching, many of them tend to be something more complicated than a simple "plug and play" flash drive. There are plenty of options that enable you to use your iPhone for storage of files via wifi or the internet, but the utility of these apps seem to be rather limited. So, is it possible to create a true replacement for you flash drive?
The answer is yes! In my trials, the most useful thing that I have found for turning my iPhone into a USB flash drive is USB Drive app for iPhone. USB Drive enables you to create a partition on your iPhone that will be used as a iPhone USB Flash drive. All you will need to do is plug in your iPhone with the included USB cable and you will be ready to go on any computer. The best part of this is that with your new iPhone USB drive, you will be able to choose the size of your drive.
Steps to Install USB Drive App on Your iPhone
Steps 1-13 are for novice users of Cydia. If you are simply looking for the source and some details, use http://apt.dmytro.me as the source and skip to step 13.
- Make sure that your iPhone is jailbroken. You will need to have jailbroken your iPhone in order to use this application. Jailbreaking is relatively easy and it should take you about 30 minutes.
- Open Cydia app
- Tap on "Manage" at the bottom
- Tap on "Sources" in the middle of the screen
- Tap "Edit" on the top right of the screen
- Tap "Add" on the top left of the screen
- Enter http://apt.dmytro.me into the address bar. To avoid any error, copy this address from your iPhone browser to ensure that the address is entered correctly
- Tap on the source you just entered (apt.dmytro.me)
- Tap on USB Drive app
- Tap on install and confirm on the top right corner
- Tap return to Cydia. Your installation is now complete. Now we will have to open the application and set up our new flash drive!
- Exit Cydia and open USB Drive. The icon will be green and will have a picture of a USB flash drive.
- First decide, which iPhone USB drive mode you want to use:
- Choose a name for your drive
- Choose the size of your iPhone USB Drive
- Your iPhone USB drive is now set up! You should see the drive that you named on your computer!
There are three different modes that you can choose from:
iTunes+USB Mode
In this mode USB Drive replaces Picture Transfer Protocol (PTP) interface with Mass Storage interface and lets you use the iPhone as a USB Drive. At the same time you can perform iTunes synchronization, developers can use XCode debugger ,etc. In this mode USB Mass Storage will not work on Windows with iTunes or Apple USB Drivers installed.
Default Mode
This is the iPhone default mode. USB Drive doesn't install daemon application nor modify any USB settings. Picture Transfer Protocol (PTP) is active as well as iTunes synchronization and tethering over USB.
Drive Only Mode
This mode is to resolve compatibility issues with Windows and iTunes. In this mode USB Drive changes the iPhone's USB product ID. This will prevent iTunes synchronization, but USB Mass Storage will work on Windows (and other operating systems). Switch to the Default or Drive + iTunes mode will restore iTunes sync.
In my opinion the iTunes+ USB Seems to work best for Macs. The Drive only option works well for PCs. However, It is rather easy to switch between the different modes. You only need to reboot in order to switch between these modes.
This is not necessary but you might as well in order to keep everything organized.
You can choose a size up to the total amount of free space that you have on your iPhone. In the example picture, there is only 677 megabytes free. The drive can be much larger though if you have more free space on your phone!
In the example photo, I have named my drive whatever. You can name your drive whatever you want.
There are plenty of other substitutes that you can try. However there hasn't been anything that has seemed to work as well and simply as this application. With this application, after set-up, it really feels like you have a simple iPhone Flash drive! Not some quirky unreliable piece of software that will get your files transferred after 30 minutes of playing around. If you have any problems with using your iPhone as a USB drive, consider trying one of the different modes available in the application.
What if my iPhone is not a jailbroken one?I found another guide about this, but not sure if it works.
im using a mac i set it up and its not coming up under devices like yours appears and thats where i need it! any suggestions?? pennstatefan73@aol.com
I cant change to drive only mode, it reboots but stays in drive and itunes mode. any suggestions?
im having the same problem!
i installed this app on my iphone. i can splitt my memory and so on. but wenn i try to stick my mo to the pc it isnt realized from it. pls need some help :/i got a dell with windows 7 and a iPhone 4s
and sorry if my english is bad… im from austria ;)
Hey, I split 10GB of 32GB and now i can not see it. And i dont know how to delete it. Do you have any clue?
this is my problem too!big shit to this tweak!avoid usb drive!
look under /var/spool/mdt/ one of those (if you have multiple) folders should house your 10gb .img file. delete it there
hi,
how can i access the files through iphone? where are they?
they are in ifile under var/volumes
it’s just written the name of the disk (for example you name the disk WHATEVER, then it written in the iFile as WHATEVER.img) but you can access it. I really need to know how to access it so i can use the file in the disk through my iPhone. Anybody help, please?? u may contact me directly via my email address: bop_sixth@yahoo.com thanks before.