My Phone Explorer will not connect

I see you have made this thread already.

I don’t understand, you seem to have fixed it there?

clayto,

Run MPE on your phone. Its window [which appears after you've tapped its icon twice] shows the IP address it is now using. So you can stick that in the MPE on the computer, File, Settings, Connection
- I've just had to change mine as well. I only ran it to check I'd given you the right menu instructions.

MPE updates on your phone can change the IP it chooses. I've had to change mine several times in the past year.

Once you have connected successfully, that IP should be fine until the next update on your phone.

There has been a period when MPE would run automatically on the phone when it was interrogated by MPE from your computer despite the connection being on WiFi. That has stopped and MPE on the phone has to be deliberately started on the phone before trying to connect over WiFi from MPE on your computer.
- Perhaps it is now the case that only USB connections automatically start MPE on the phone [that was the behaviour several versions ago].

All the best,
Denis

The enable USB debugging was hidden away in a hidden menu in Android. I've just looked for it on my current phone [Android 12] but it's not there.
For earlier versions, the procedure was explained in Howto and FAQ Use Android Phones with MPE - FJ Software
I don't recall when I last had to set USB debugging up.

I don't recall when I last used MPE over a USB cable connection to my phone [I normally use WiFi]. It's not working now. Perhaps I've never tried on this phone before???

- - - Updated - - -

I think there is another problem at work here.

Can you connect to the phone by USB so that it shows up in File explorer? [i.e. nothing to do with MPE]
- You need to connect it to a USB port, go to its File explorer entry, respond to the phone prompt to set it to file transfer and then you should be able to see it and browse into it.

Denis

clayto said:

I think I can see what you are getting at----I may have a problem connecting my phone to the PC via USB, regardless of MPE in which case MPE would have the usb problem. I have just checked and so far the phone does not show up, in Windows Explorer (or similar apps). I have not tried connecting my Android 11 phone to the PC before. It my first Android phone but I remember successfully connecting my previous Windows Lumia 345.

Ironic, isn't it. It was you who was not persuaded by my suggestion of always trying an MPE USB connection first. Your stance made me re-evaluate things and I had not even tried a USB MPE connection with my new phone.

My last long-lasting phone was Android 10 and I definitely tried MPE with USB on that one. I also definitely set up USB debugging because I still have a couple of screenshots of it. I seem not to have used the FJSoft instructions for this but a guide by Samsung [it was a Samsung A40] that might be worded generally enough to help you - How do I turn on the Developer Options menu on my Samsung Galaxy device - Samsung Support UK

After the A40, I tried a Samsung A52 with Android 11. I definitely connected it by USB but my notes are not clear about whether or not I tried an MPE USB connection. I did not have the phone long because it had a fault. I did not have its replacement long because it had the same fault. Samsung provide a USB driver for their phones but I have no idea how it would have behaved without that anyway.

I'm on Android 11 now - Xiaomi Poco X3 Pro. I have not installed any USB driver for it - Xiaomi do not provide one so I'd have to try the FJSoft suggestion [a generic USB driver] to see if it makes any difference to MPE. But I have no problems with the phone showing up in File explorer.

My earlier phones were HTC [Android 4, 6] and I always installed their USB driver. I definitely connected MPE by USB.

In short, I have not seen anything to suggest that omitting a USB driver makes any difference to being able to see the phone in File explorer.
You do have to connect, browse to it, try reading it, set the on-phone choice to file transfers, then you can see the phone's contents.

Do you have a spare cable? It seems to me that a cable fault is the most likely explanation for the failure to be shown in File explorer.

Do you have friends with a computer who would trust you enough for you to connect your phone with your cable to their computer?
- That would rule out any USB connector hardware error on your computer.
- They would probably have a spare cable you could experiment with as well.

clayto said:

If this is (part of) the problem I guess it would still not explain the unstable WiFi connection?

I agree. Is your WiFi at all dodgy with anything else? Are your network adapter drivers & Bios up to date?
Oh, I'm sorry. I've just noticed that your computer is a Chuwi. I have a Chuwi Hi10 Pro. Chuwi cannot even be relied upon to provide drivers for the right hardware*** and I would never trust them enough to do a Bios update.

*** I've had to help out half a dozen other users who reinstalled Windows then installed the Chuwi-supplied driver package. I used Backup and Restore Device Drivers - TenForumsTutorials before reinstalling so I would not be left high & dry.

I bought my Chuwi along with an integrated keyboard [so it looks like a small laptop].
- One of the first things I did was buy a replacement WiFi adapter because the onboard one was useless. My integrated keyboard has two USB connections so I could just fit a USB WiFi adpter & simply disable the original one.
- Your system specs refer to a hub of some kind. Does that give you extra USB connections so you can try the same as me?
I have definitely connected my old phone to the Chuwi by USB as well as by WiFi hotspot. But probably not since a few months before the plague started [I bought the Chuwi as a light computer for travelling].

clayto said:

I have connected the Android phone to USB Flash Drives in the past and have just done it. Has this anything to do with OTG? The connector I have just used is OTG but I have no reason to think the cable I use to connect the phone to the PC (eg. for MPE) is OTG. If it does require OTG why did MPE work so well with the phone cable when I first tried it?

I kept reading about OTG but never once found a difference between connectors, cables or USB sticks that claimed to be OTG and those that did not. I suspected then that OTG was just a marketing trick.
If you used the same cable when connecting your Lumia phone, that confirms that he cable spec makes no difference. Cables do wear out just like any other component.

clayto said:

On another but related point I have discovered something which causes problems with MPE. When it is starting to connect and goes through the list of things to synchronise it either takes a long time or fails completely at the last two specific items, which are "Refresh file lists" and "Sync photos". If I see it struggling at this stage I know connection will not be successful.

I have the connect on startup setting but not the sync as soon as connected setting. So I can see in MPE status bar at the bottom of its window that the User is loaded and the phone is connected before I try doing anything.
I've just had to change the IP address again and I'd only checked it a few days ago [during my last post to you] - I have not had any updates inbetween.

Once you've resolved connection problems, perhaps we can compare MPE settings to see if there is any significant difference between us but I don't expect there is. I think your USB connection problem is just that, a USB connection problem.



Denis

I have a vague feeling that you & I have discussed this in another thread so please do tell me if I'm trying to teach you how to suck eggs.

Does your Chuwi have S0 Modern standby [S0 Low power idle] rather than S3 Sleep?
Whenever people discuss "Sleep" they mean S3 Sleep.
Run this command to find out

Code:

PowerCfg -a

If so, as soon as your display turns off, your computer starts entering a progressively harsher [less power hungry] idle condition.

You will need to have Connected standby on to keep WiFi connections in that state.
How to Check if Connected or Disconnected Modern Standby [also PowerCfg -a] - TenForumsTutorials
Enable or Disable Network Connectivity in Modern Standby - TenForumsTutorials

I've tried attacking this from several angles but nothing really exorcises the curse of S0.
- I always run with Connected standby on
- display always on
- display always on but with a black screensaver allowed to kick in after a period of time to [vaguely] mimic having the display turn off after a period.
- disabling S0 Modern standby [this was a complete failure, S0 was disabled but S3 was not enabled. Apparently our CPUs just cannot handle this - my attempt stopped me connecting to anything with WiFi so I had to undo it].



Denis

Are you sure that the connection is being made & kept?
You should continue seeing something like this in its status bar at the bottom of the MPE window on the phone.


And you should continue to see the MPE icon on the phone. Does clicking on that to see its window perhaps reveal additional info - when first connected & after the problem has occurred?

Your picture returns 'Invalid attachment'
I assume that this shows the last two items and I would like to see them.

All the best,
Denis