Though it cannot be denied that, with the emergence and rapid growth of multi-media messaging services like WhatsApp and WeChat, the good old short messaging service or SMS is still largely used by many phone users to communicate with many of their friends.
For one, you don’t need a smartphone to avail this messaging service, nor W-Fi or other internet connectivity options.
Your carrier’s signal is sufficient to send and receive messages. But going a step further, you can use your computer to send and receive text messages and manage them to good effect if you follow some simple steps.
Here they are:
Sending Text Messages from Your Android Phone to PC
You will first need to connect the Android phone to your PC. This can be done in two ways—through the USB cable or through a Wi-Fi connection.
Follow this step-by-step process:
- Download and install the Android Assistant app here.
- To connect your PC and mobile phone, you will find one interactive display on the screen; you have to have your Android Assistant app open for this to occur.
- On the screen, you will have the details of the device you have connected, such as the brand and model; e.g. LG Q6 or the number the manufacturer assigns.
- On the top panel, you will find several menus; click on “Information.”
- On the left side of the dialogue box that opens, SMS will be one of the items on the menu. Below it, there will be two selections: All Messages and Unread Messages.
- Now, you can choose to export all the messages from your mobile phone to the PC by the click of the mouse. The messages can be stored on the PC in just the text form as it appears (with the .TXT tag or in the XML format for recovery and reference at any future date).
- From this dialogue box, you can freely type out and send messages and read the ones delivered on your message inbox on your phone.
Similar Feature Available on Android Messages App
You can also get a similar facility to view and reply to SMS messages on your Android phone, connected to a PC through a USB cable, by downloading and installing the Android Messages app.
It lets you export select or all messages from your phone to the computer, so that you can read them on the large screen.
Why Use Your PC to View Text Messages?
Though you might have read the above steps and understood the entire process, the question on your mind could still be why you would want to do this in the first place.
There are many valid reasons—one is that some people may feel comfortable reading text on a larger screen, such as a laptop or a PC monitor, than on their handheld device.
If there are messages that demand two or three people to read together, the PC screen is the better choice.
More than just simple viewing, if a reply is to be typed and sent, a PC keyboard offers a much better alternative than the keys on a mobile phone.
Many individuals may be uncomfortable typing the right keys; either their fingers are quite thick, or the keyboard on the mobile too small, or both.
Even in the routine course, they may be used to typing on the larger keyboard and feel at home.
Some people have switched to desktop messaging purely out of convenience. They could be working on their computer and may not feel like checking their mobile device for new messages.
When the same message flashes on the computer screen, it’s easy to read it and send a quick reply.
Storing & Retrieving Messages
Beyond the above two reasons for using a PC to handle text messages, possibly the most important one has to do with the storage of messages on the PC.
It is true that the phones these days come with enormous internal storage capacities; as such, the size of the messages being stored is not an issue.
But, if you were to even accidentally delete a message on your phone, there is no way you can get it back.
But if you synchronize your message inbox with your PC, you can easily retrieve the message you want at any time.
Digging out old messages from a mobile phone and going back and forth many times before you arrive at the one you wish to read again could be a cumbersome process.
On the PC, managing storage is much easier with the panel showing the message content on the screen, along with options on what to do with it.
Make Your Choice or Try Both & Select the Better One
You may come across apps other than the two discussed here. Study their features yourself.
You can download and use one for some time and then try the other one. Whichever app does a better job, keep it.
In most of these apps, there are provisions to not only store and operate the messaging service, but you can also sync and share other files and music as well.
In the end, your comfort and convenience should matter more than anything else.