Get your Windows Phone photos on a Mac (photos)

Your smartphone is often the most convenient way to snap pictures on the go. But unlike your point-and-shoot, a smartphone can be tricky to transfer your photos to your computer from. One of the tougher scenarios is trying to transfer photos and video from a Windows phone to a Mac -- but it can be done.

First, open up your Mac's App Store and search for "Windows Phone 7 Connector." You should find a free app by this name made by Microsoft. After installing it, locate the app in your Apps folder and launch it. You'll see this intro page asking you to connect your phone.

With the Micro-USB cable that came with your phone, connect your phone to your Mac. If you get an error, unplug and try again. It may take a few attempts, but eventually you should see an image of your phone and some new options.

First stop, hit the Device Options button, make sure the "Import photos" option is checked, and change the event name to something more memorable than "Camera Roll." If you want, you can also personalize your phone's name here up at the top.

Hit done, then hit sync, and your photos should get pulled over into iPhoto.

If you have a different app you prefer to manage your photos in, go into Preferences and select it from the list. If it's not there, you're out of luck.

If you don't have iPhoto, or just prefer to grab your photos manually, select the Browse Device option and you should see a list of all the media you can transfer from the phone. From here you can drag and drop files onto your desktop or into another folder.

Finally, if none of this is working for you, you can always bypass the software altogether and e-mail the file right from the phone. It's tedious, but it'll work.

For a video version of this tutorial, head over to CNET TV.