No need to apologize , though what I actually meant is still slightly different.
Mass Storage connection makes sense for a mass storage device and (by convention) this implies on Windows that a drive letter is assigned to volumes on it, but this drive letter assignment is the result of the way Windows works because it has access to the PhysicalDrive and - via mount manager - to logical volumes (what get a drive letter) and their filesystems.
The (stupid) PTP/MTP approach is at a higher level and never provided drive letters because it has no connection to the physical drive, and what I was lamenting about was not the lack of drive letter access but rather the lack of the more direct access that allows otherwise (besides other possibilities) "normal" drive letter access.
A good example of a similar approach is FTP, you have NO idea when you connect to a FTP site/directory what OS is running "there", nor which filesystem you are actually accessing.
Still you have exposed some file characteristics, like (usually) size and date.
If you take (on a "recent") window a ftp site you can map it to a drive (drive letter) just fine, *like*:
https://www.thewindowsclub.com/map-an-ftp-drive-windows
or - via third party tool - *like*:
https://www.ferrobackup.com/map-ftp-as-disk.html
Still only a part of the data (those provided by the FTP) are available, so, even if you have *some* access via drive letter, you do not have the same amount of data/access as if it was a local disk drive.
In the case of a FTP (please read as "remote") device this is of course "normal", but in the case of PTP/MTP the mass storage device is "local" allright, connected by a (usually too short to be practical in most real world situations) USB cable, and there is no reason for arbitrarily removing (by using the stupid connection protocol) otherwise technically possible ways to access it, if not the utter stupidity and total lack of respect for the customers that are common between the good MS guys and the good Google guys (and all the sheep, which include the large majority of customers and the actual manufacturers of the phones).
What anyone[1] would actually want to be able to do would be:
1) periodically connect his/her device to a PC
and
2) run a full dd of the phone "as is" to an image or restore the phone to an exact previous state by dding an image to it
OR
3) use Robocopy or similar or backup/restore software
AND:
4) perform any "common" maintenance for mass storage devices, like copying files, defragmenting the filesystem, etc.
This would be easy, simple and effective, needing not an internet connection (think of the stupid "cloud" backups) nor any particular software from the manufacturer of the phone device (usually crappy, bloated and what not).
Probably too simple and easy .
jaclaz
[1] anyone with some common sense, I mean, a very small minority of people in my eperience.