[iMore Question]

I have a lot of screenshots (more than 1000) taken on the iPad 3 (occupied around 6Gb). I'm running out of space on the iPad, but didn't want to remove those screenshots. Luckily I found about a PNGOUT utility for Windows (lossless compression, reduces to ~ 50% of original filesize). I transferred the 6Gb (1000+) worth of screenshots (which are all in PNG format) via USB cable to desktop PC running Windows, then used PNGOUT (took a few hours to process) to reduce their file sizes (total size now shrank to 3Gb). I'd like to transfer these reduced filesize PNG screenshots back to the iPad but I can't figure out how to do that. Kindly help how to do that?

[Ledsteplin]

Welcome to iMore! I never heard of PNGOUT. I upload photos to Box and Dropbox for storage, then delete them from the camera roll.

[robertk328]

Welcome to iMore!

Are these files you use often? Could you store them somewhere like Dropbox. This would:

1. Keep them off your iPad, saving storage
2. Allow you access whenever you need them (as long as you're on wifi/cellular)

Downside is if you need them frequently you could use up your data.

Another thought -- do you use iCloud Photo Library? This would be more seamless than Dropbox, but you'd still keep most on the iPad. Ones that aren't used frequently would be stored in full on iCloud, with reference photos in your Photos library on the iPad. Those that don't get used frequently, much like with Dropbox, would need to be downloaded, but the positive side is the ones you do tend to use most would most likely stay on the iPad.

Third, if you just want to get those 1,000 or whatever screen shots back, you can sync them with iTunes. Connect your iPad, fire up iTunes, and go to the Photos section.



Inside there it will give you the option to Sync a folder to your iPad (as long as you don't already use iCloud Photo Library). I've used this a good bit in the past with great results. Plus side to this is all photos are on your iPad (no data needed), but that's also the downside as all photos are back on the iPad. iTunes may also optimize the screenshots further, which may affect the file size. I don't think it would upsample them, but may downsample them a bit more than you did already.

Good luck!