topic Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help! in EOS DSLR & Mirrorless Cameras

My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

aprince1982 — Wed, 19 Mar 2014 23:39:41 GMT

I've installed the necessary software from Canon, but no luck. Any suggestions?

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

Danny — Wed, 19 Mar 2014 23:59:45 GMT

Hi, aprince1982!

So that the Community can help you better, we will need to know exactly which version of Mac OS is running on your MacBook Pro. That, and any other details you'd like to give will help the Community better understand your issue!

If this is a time-sensitive matter, our US-based technical support team is standing by, ready to help 24/7 via Email at http://bit.ly/EmailCanon or by phone at 1-800-OK-CANON (1-800-652-2666) weekdays between 8 AM and midnight ET (5 AM to 9 PM PT).

Thanks and have a great day!

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

aprince1982 — Thu, 20 Mar 2014 13:00:29 GMT

I have Mac OS X Lion 10.7.5 (11G63)

Thank you!

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

TCampbell — Fri, 21 Mar 2014 15:09:28 GMT

Attach your camera to the computer using the Canon supplied USB cable. After attaching the camera, power the camera on.

Next...

Open Finder and navigigate to your "Utilities" folder then launch the "System Information" application.)

e.g.: "Applications" -> "Utilties" -> "System Information"

Incidentally, the short-cut to get into the Utilities folder is to open finder and press Command+Shift+U (U = Utilities). You can also use the Finder main menubar and pull down the "Go" menu and you'll see all these commonly accessed folders in a list.

In the left-margin of the System Information window, there are a few major sections... the first one is labeled "Hardware". Slightly indented below the Hardware section is a list of hardware types... e.g.. ATA, Audio, Bluetooth, etc. If you do not see these listed, then click the tiny triangle left of the world "Hardware" to expose all the categories in the hardware section.

Near the bottom of the list you should see "USB". Please click on "USB" to highlight it.

On the right side top frame of the System Information window you should see the USB Device Tree. Inspect the rows on that tree looking for a device named "Canon Digital Camera" (Canon will be in the name.)

If you see this, then the computer DOES recognize that the camera is attached.

NOTE: It is very important that you attach and power on the camera BEFORE you launch the "System Information" utility. This is because "System Information" is not continuously scanning for devices. It only checks the list of attached devices when it is launched. If you attach launch System Information and then attach the camera then the camera will not have been present when it scanned for devices and it wont show on the list. If that happens, go to the menu-bar for System Information and select "File" -> "Refresh Information" and this will cause it to re-scan.

Let us know if you can at least get this far. This will confirm that the computer can at least see the camera as a "device". This information will show up in System Utility regardless of any installed software on your computer (e.g. it would not matter if you didn't have any software or drivers at all... it would STILL show up in "System Information". This is a simple report of the raw devices detected on the USB bus whether there are drivers for those devices or not.

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

Julius — Fri, 21 Mar 2014 15:19:50 GMT

Great post, TCampbell!

Just to piggyback, we've noticed that Macbooks tend to be very restrictive on how many devices can be plugged in via USB, so if you happen to have a lot of things plugged into your USB ports (external hard drives, your phone, other devices that might be charging, or whatever), please unplug them, if only temporarily so that we can make sure that your Mac is seeing your Rebel in System Information. After you've done this, let us know your progress!

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

aprince1982 — Sat, 22 Mar 2014 12:23:42 GMT

Thank you TCampbell! My laptop does recognize the camera now ... but now my issue is getting the actual Canon photo applications to recognize the camera (and the pics to transfer to the application vs. automatically transferring to iPhoto). Any suggestions?

Thanks so much for the assistance!!

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

TCampbell — Sat, 22 Mar 2014 14:37:29 GMT

@aprince1982 wrote:
Thank you TCampbell! My laptop does recognize the camera now ... but now my issue is getting the actual Canon photo applications to recognize the camera (and the pics to transfer to the application vs. automatically transferring to iPhoto). Any suggestions?

Thanks so much for the assistance!!

Open iPhoto (the camera does not need to be attached).
In iPhoto, use the main menubar and navigate to "iPhoto" -> "Preferences..."
In the preferences window which appears, the left-most icon along the top is the "General" category, select that if it is not already selected.
You should see an option which reads "Connecting camera opens: " next to a selection list. Your selection list may be set to "iPhoto". I set mine to "No Application" (which means the computer will not automatically launch anything).
Close the preferences window and if you wish, exist iPhoto.

When I connect my camera, nothing launches (as a result of that setting). I can launch any photo application I choose and the camera is available (since nothing else has grabbed the camera.)

Hopefully that resolves your issue. Good luck!

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

shilpi — Mon, 13 Oct 2014 17:58:21 GMT

Thanks for the detailed note.

Interestingly, my Canon Rebel XTi still does not show up under the Hub. However, it's visible in iPhoto and iPhoto is able to import photos as well.

What can I do to see it under devices and import photos bypassing iPhoto?

Thanks,

Shilpi

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

TCampbell — Mon, 13 Oct 2014 18:18:15 GMT

The devices list ONLY updates when you launch the "System Information" utility. If you connected or powered on the camera after launching, then it wont show up in the list. You can force System Information to refresh by doing a command+R (or using the menubar in System Information, select "File -> Refresh Information".

If you don't want to use iPhoto, then

1) launch iPhoto

2) Navigate into iPhoto -> Preferences...

3) Select the "General" tab (icon on the top-left of the preferences sub-window)

4) There's an option for "Connecting camera opens:" with a selection list. Set the value to "No application".

(close all the windows and you can also quit iPhoto).

Now when you connect a camera and power it up, iPhoto will not launch and you can launch the application of your choice.

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

shilpi — Mon, 13 Oct 2014 18:55:35 GMT

Thanks, Tim.

My camera was connected and powered before I launched the System information utility. However, it did not show up.

If I turn the preferences of iPhoto to No application, my camera won't be recongnized by any other application, utility or the system natively.

I have to go through iPhoto where it does recognize my camera and import photos from there. Even lightroom does not recongnize it.

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

pdxjasmine — Tue, 23 Dec 2014 03:35:51 GMT

I am having a similar issue. I just bought a new MacBook Air about a month ago and connected my Digitial Rebel via the USB cord. iPhoto (and Image Capture) recognize the camera but no photos show up. I double checked that there are images on the CF card by viewing the photos on my camera.

I have OS X Yosemite and I installed the software that came with the camera.

I'm hoping there is a fix to this even though my camera is about 10 years old now!

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

RobertTheFat — Tue, 23 Dec 2014 17:17:05 GMT

@pdxjasmine wrote:
I am having a similar issue. I just bought a new MacBook Air about a month ago and connected my Digitial Rebel via the USB cord. iPhoto (and Image Capture) recognize the camera but no photos show up. I double checked that there are images on the CF card by viewing the photos on my camera.

I have OS X Yosemite and I installed the software that came with the camera.

I'm hoping there is a fix to this even though my camera is about 10 years old now!

There's a recent article in another thread that seemed to suggest that older Rebels used a different protocol to talk to computers. Though that protocol is now antiquated, it apparently still works; but you have to manually set the camera to use it. I'm not sure which thread it was, but it's one that's still active.

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

pdxjasmine — Wed, 24 Dec 2014 05:37:23 GMT

After searching the Apple forums for a solution, I got it to work. I changed the Communcation setting in the camera from 'Normal' to 'PTP' and everything worked just like it used to!

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

AnnMarie — Mon, 30 Mar 2015 20:35:07 GMT

Jasmine -

Thanks so much for the tip. I have been searching for a month to correct this issue and you saved me fron insanity. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you!!!

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

jmrphoto — Sat, 18 Apr 2015 19:09:36 GMT

Where did you find the Communications setting?

I have used my several years old Canon Rebel with my Mac many times. I have never had a problem uploading pictures. Suddenly the camera will not speak to the Mac. I know the Mac recognizes the camers as it is listed in the System Utilities.

Any help?

Canon's instructions for connecting camera to computer are of no help.

Thanks.

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

missjones — Mon, 04 May 2015 16:03:17 GMT

I am having the same issue. I have upgraded to Yosemite and was able to still upload my pictures off the camera. With the new update changing iphoto to "Photos" I cannot upload the photos off of the camera, whether it's by directly through the SD reader or through attaching the camera via the cord. Through this forum I was able to ascertain that the macbook is reading the camera...but, I canot access the photos. Also, other forums have suggested switching camera to PTP rather than "normal" from what I can tell my camera does not have that in the menu options.

Please advise,

Thank you!

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

Mon — Fri, 19 Jun 2015 21:22:53 GMT

Hi Canon community. Because of this forum, I finally figured out how to hook my camera up to my Mac! Thank you
Question: is there a different method when importing a video taken by my Canon Rebel t3i to my Mac Pro??

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

kiwisimon — Tue, 11 Aug 2015 02:38:22 GMT

Just as an extra I was having the same trouble. After turning on the camera after attaching the usb , Nothing. Then I pushed the playback arrow on the Rebel just below the LCD screen and it all went swimmingly. Maybe it will help others. Cheers

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

khouse — Fri, 28 Aug 2015 21:19:30 GMT

Hey Canon Community! I am hoping you can help me out. I have a Macbook Pro, and it is also not finding my camera. I tried the suggestion above, and it is still not registering. Incidentally, I tried to go to photos and it still doesn't show up. I've tried both USB ports, as well as different cables. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Re: My Macbook Pro will not recognize my Canon Rebel T3i when I plug it in. Please help!

kiwisimon — Sat, 29 Aug 2015 00:58:17 GMT

After all my problems the best solution I found was to use the original USB cable that Canon supplied. No problems since I did that. Some lower qaulity cables just don'T have the ability to transfer data well. Good luck. TRy installing canon updates as well and restarting your Macbook.