Outlook Contacts "invalid entryid" error after edit on iPod Touch and sync

This is only a temporary fix...and not totally correct. Modifying the "broken" contact in any way and saving it again will fix the "invalid entryid" problem until the next sync. For example, you could put a space after the email address, hit the backspace key to delete the space, and save...voila...problem fixed for this contact! Now sync with iPhone...voila...problem's back.

We need Apple to make a real fix for this issue. It's quite the showstopper for those of us who use our Outlook & iPhones for business. Not to mention annoying.

I agree - the same thing has been happening to me too. I think it began with the latest update to v. 1.1.3. There was also an Outlook update last week that not only screwed up my outgoing mail relay, but deleted my mail account from my iPhone. It was restored on the next sync however. I'm just wondering if this entryid issue could have something to do with Outlook update as well as the v.1.1.3 update.

It's happening on my iPhone as well... I would suggest it come from the new iTunes version maybe ? A change to the sync system ?

Same problem here.

The last post seems valid but the procedure is not easier than simply exporting contacts to a Excel file and bringing them back in. The export/import fixes all problems and it's 2 steps. Marion's approach may be too time consuming if numerous contacts are bad. I've seen as many as 10 go bad on me. Perhaps exporting it to Excel and then select that field (the entire column) and delete all the entries and re-import it back in would be helpful. Obviously, keep the columns Email Display name, Email Display name 2, etc but purge all the data out would be a better solution. But a question still remains, is this just a patch? Does this fix it permanently? If not, clearly Apple/Outlook has an issue here that I sure hope somebody addresses as it's pretty severe.

I used to sync with my Nokia without any issues.

On another note, when is Apple going to fix the problem of not being able to get my camera roll into My Pictures on my P.C.? These are the only 2 issues I have and I'm sure these must be major concerns for P.C. users to have Apple address.

I also am not sure what causes this but what I did find is how to find out which contacts have the problem. If you are sending or responding to an email, click on the "To.." button. It brings up a popup with all your contacts listed. If the email address for a contact does not show up in this popup, then that contact has the entryid problem. I also found that just retyping the email address and resaving the contact eliminates the problem. Tedious but it works!

thanks for the postings. I had the same problem. Is there a way to do that outlook contact changing in a batch ? For > 1000 contacts it seems quite a lot of work to do that "change every contact" thing.... any ideas ? thx, simon

You may want to try this. I exported my contacts to a .csv (Windows) using Outlook 2007. I then reimported using File > Import/Export and all of my contacts open properly now. Hopefully this will save you from having to manually edit contacts especially if you have a lot. It would be a good idea to email yourself the .csv file to save it to your .mac account or to another email provider such as gmail, yahoo etc.

Exporting and importing contacts works...but there's a careful consideration you must make: doing this to a TXT/CSV file will break any links between your contacts and other items (e.g. calendar appointments, birthday reminders, etc).

I'd really really love it if Apple would ACTUALLY FIX or at least COMMENT on this issue. It's amazing how many PC users are experiencing it, but no fix from Apple.

Quick fix method for those who really can't be bothered with any manual methods. Below is a macro for Outlook that will, starting with the currently selected contact folder and including subfolders (mobileme groups), reset all email display names which effectively fixes the EntryID issue. There's no error checking, it's pretty raw but does the job. Hope it helps.


<STARTMACROCODE>

Option Explicit

Sub FixEntryIDs()
Call FixEntryID
End Sub

Sub FixEntryID(Optional ByVal contacts As folder)
Dim item As ContactItem
Dim subf As folder
Dim changed As Boolean

If IsMissing(contacts) Or contacts Is Nothing Then
Set contacts = ActiveExplorer.CurrentFolder
End If

For Each item In contacts.Items
changed = False
If Len(item.Email1DisplayName) Then
changed = True
item.Email1DisplayName = ""
End If

If Len(item.Email2DisplayName) Then
changed = True
item.Email2DisplayName = ""
End If

If Len(item.Email3DisplayName) Then
changed = True
item.Email3DisplayName = ""
End If

If changed Then
Call item.Save
End If
Next

For Each subf In contacts.Folders
Call FixEntryID(subf)
Next
End Sub

I tried this and get a compilation error. I opened the macro from tools, defined new macro, copy and paste the code and tried to run.

It gives me a compilation error on Outlook 2003 at line

Sub FixEntryID(Optional ByVal contacts As folder)
(User Defined type undefined)

Sorry, forgot to mention this was running in Outlook 2007. I don't think the "Folder" object exists in 2003. Try changing it to MAPIFolder instead.

Don't forget to have your contacts folder active before you run it as well. It probably won't take kindly to other folder and item types.

This worked nicely for me on OL2007 across the 4 machines I sync to.

This really is a problem...I'm not sure if it's the synch with the 3G or making the serious mistake of trying the "free" trial of MobileMe (which I regretted as soon as I hit the synch button), but oh well. Anyway, whichever it was, it's totally screwed up my address book in Outlook - the contacts list still looks OK, but it's changed the address book and email addresses to last name first, which I hate. I haven't been able to figure out a way to change everything back (except by maybe re-synching to my Palm) and if I try to change entries in the address book, I get the invalid entryid message.

I had no problems with my original iPhone and the previous versions of iTunes, but when I upgraded to the iPhone 3G and installed latest version of iTunes I experienced all the symptoms described...........

It's marvelous how many problems you can buy for £100!

Apple will not be part of my 5 a day until they fix this one!

I am also having this problem. Thanks to those who posted these messages.

It will save me time looking for a solution and I will wait for Apple to fix it.

Message was edited by: Lou in NYC