Mount Windows phone as a removable device

Question

I know that the Zune software doesn't work with Linux of any kind, but I found a guide here that shows how to change regedit in Windows to use the phone as a removable device with direct access to the files. Is there a way to do this in Linux? Specifically Mint 12

Answer 1

According to this noisy thread at answers.microsoft.com, the Regedit trick in the link you included is nothing but a trick, i.e. the device is still connected via MTP, the software just enables you some make-believe explorer access.

However, MTP is supported by Linux software, too, so this could be a viable option; still the data at Wikipedia seems a little confusing... I can't tell if the MTPZ ("Zune") extension is usable using some Linux tool or not.

Edit: Actually, this sounds like no:

Multimedia content is transferred through Media Transfer Protocol (MTP); however, its proprietary MTP extensions ("MTPZ") place an interoperability barrier between the Zune and previous MTP-based software.

Answer 2

I do not believe there is a way to access the filesystem of a Windows phone directly from Linux. You could alternately use VMWare Player to install a Windows OS and use the regedit hack you referenced above to access the Filesystem of the Windows phone. VMware Player will allow you to have 'Shared Folders' with your Linux host so you can move files to and from the Windows Phone and Linux host.

There are several ways to sync a Windows phone with a Linux Desktop if that is your goal.