As Microsoft explain the sync wizard is about helping people find the best way to get content on to and off their Windows Phone device:
If you want to move media or sync stuff between your computer and phone, there's always at least one good way to do it.
This wizard will help you find the way that best suits you and the devices you use. Just pick the thing you want to move or sync, answer a few quick questions, and we'll point you in the right direction.
The wizard may also be useful for existing users. For example, the ringtone section describes several ways of copying custom ringtones to a Windows Phone 8 device (using the Windows Phone app, using Windows Media Player and manually copying to the Ringtones folder via Windows Explorer). That's something that has become more relevant with the availability of Windows Phone 8 Update 3, which allows you specify custom ringtones for a greater variety of events.
The wizard serves as a useful reminder for the various official PC based tools that make it easier to sync and/or copy content to your Windows Phone 8 device. These include:
- Windows Phone app for Windows 8 - for both Windows 8 PCs and Windows 8 RT tablets, used for music, photo, and video sync.
- Windows Phone app for desktop - for PCs and laptops running Windows 7 or Windows 8, used for music, photo, video, and podcast sync.
- Windows Media Player - for Windows 7 PCs, used for music sync.
- File / Windows Explorer - for manually copying (MTP transfer) content files.
- Windows Phone app for Mac - for Mac computers, used for music, photo, video, and podcast sync.
To this list we would also add the Nokia Photo Transfer tool, which is the easiest way to copy photos off your Windows Phone on to your Mac.