What I do is to take the camera SD card, put it a SD->usb adaptor. Plug it into the usb port on my computer.
Treat the SD card just like a thumbdrive. Navigate to the directory where your pictures are stored (they will NOT be in the root directory (Director same=same as folders). Then copy them to a folder on your HDD. Verify that you can open them.
If all is good you can delete them on the SD card just like any other file.