Windows iTunes wiping out all iPhone contacts

Question

Windows iTunes wiping out all iPhone contacts

I just had the Windows iTune sync wipe out all my contacts on iPhone. What I was trying to do is overwrite the iPhone calendar with the PC calendar. So carefully I check the appropriate box in the advanced section to only overwrite the calendar. Contacts was uncheck in the upper section and grayed out in the advanced section. This worked fine for the calendar but all contacts were wiped out. TG I disabled mobileme and was able to restore contact from my MBP. Has anyone else noticed this bizarre behavior?

Mac SE, G5 Tower and Mac Book Pro, Mac OS X (10.5.2)

Posted on Sep 21, 2008 8:44 AM

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Answer 1

Sep 21, 2008 9:06 AM in response to Community User

Sounds like you disabled MobileMe over the air syncing for contact info on your iPhone before selecting replace calendar events on your iPhone below the Advanced section under the Info tab for your iPhone sync preferences followed by a sync. If over the air syncing for MM contact info is enabled on your iPhone, Contacts will not be available below the Advanced section under the Info tab for your iPhone sync preferences.

Why did you turn off OTA syncing for your MM contact info on your iPhone?

Turning this off will remove contact info from your iPhone with a warning message provided indicating this when turning it off.

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Answer 2

Sep 21, 2008 3:20 PM in response to Allan Sampson

I disabled MobileMe, in-total, on the iphone because I was afraid iTunes would "screw-up" and I did not want the iPhone to propagate any "Screw-up" to MobileMe and then MobileMe would propagate the "screw-up" down to my two Macs. The Apple syncing software is not very good at telling you what it is going to do. This was the second time iTunes/MobileMe has nuked my contacts on the iPhone. I have looked at the google calendar sync for Windows and it works fine and allows you to exactly control the directions of syncing. Now if only I could get google calendar to sync down to the Macintosh/iPhone domain.

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Answer 3

ajtcable

Level 1

10 points

Sep 21, 2008 3:27 PM in response to Community User

Merge rather than over write. I guess you should watch the buttons. I synced and never lost contacts. I don't use Mobile Me. But, it did ask me if I wanted to over write, merge or replace the contacts on my new iPhone, a replacement that also synced without issue. Good luck. I'm sure you did not start all this without at least one backup.

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Answer 4

Sep 21, 2008 3:30 PM in response to Community User

With over the air syncing for contact information enabled with your MM account on your iPhone, iTunes is not involved with syncing contact information in any shape, form, or fashion.

The Apple syncing software is not very good at telling you what it is going to do.

Under the Info tab for your iPhone sync preferences below Contacts with over the air syncing for contact information enabled on your iPhone, the following is provided.

+*Your contacts are being synced with your iPhone over the air from MobileMe.+*
*+Over-the-air sync settings can be changed on your iPhone.*+

Not sure how this can be any clearer at telling you what you have selected, and what iTunes is going to do or not going to do in regards to syncing contact information direct with the supported application on your computer via the iTunes sync process.

Sorry, but this was due to user error, not an iTunes or MM error.

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Answer 5

Sep 21, 2008 5:01 PM in response to Allan Sampson

As I said earlier, I disabled mobile me on iPhone. I also removed Mobile me from PC... so I should not have over the air sync. I checked only calendar sync (PC overwrites iPhone) so you think it's okay to erase contacts? Bizarre.

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Answer 6

Sep 21, 2008 5:07 PM in response to Community User

As I said earlier, which was copied from my first post in this thread:

+*Turning this off will remove contact info from your iPhone with a warning message provided indicating this when turning it off.*+

After turning over the air syncing for contact information for your MM account on your iPhone, did you select sync contact information with the support application on your computer below Contacts under the Info tab for your iPhone sync preferences?

Which supported application on your computer are you syncing contact information with when syncing direct with your computer via the iTunes sync process - which is Outlook 2003 or 2007, or with the address book included with Outlook Express with XP, and whatever the name was changed to for OE with Vista?

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Answer 7

Sep 21, 2008 5:46 PM in response to Allan Sampson

I guess I didn't see that warning and the contacts were removed before hooking up to the PC. I see it now and see what was done. Your quoted text I assumed was an iTunes message not an iPhone message... sorry for the confusion. I am using Outlook 2003 on the PC. So... if I leave contacts sync/pushed and turn off calendar sync/pushed (erasing iPhone calendar). Then sync my calendar on PC with iTunes. Then turn on Calendar sync/push, will this send my PC calendar to Mobile Me? Or will my Mobile Me calendar overwrite the iPhone calendar? Life would be so much easier without Windows.

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Answer 8

Sep 21, 2008 5:59 PM in response to Community User

A warning message is provided on the iPhone when turning off over the air syncing for contact information. There is no reason for this warning message to be provided with iTunes since enabling or disabling over the air syncing for contact information on the iPhone is done with the iPhone only.

Before turning on over the air syncing for contact information and calendar events for your MM account preferences on your iPhone, get your contact information and calendar events on your computer (Outlook 2003) synced with your MobileMe online address book and calendar.

After confirming all contact information and calendar events are available with your MobileMe online address book and calendar, turn on over the air syncing for contact information and calendar events for your MM account on your iPhone.

From that point forward, everything should remain in sync between your iPhone, MM, and Outlook on your PC.

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Answer 9

Sep 23, 2008 8:12 AM in response to Allan Sampson

Allan, Easier said than done. I have since discovered that my company must have some sort of super-duper weird-*** firewall/proxy that MobileMe cannot penetrate, although google calendar sync can. When I run the MM cnt panel on the PC the Calendar on MM gets corrupted and unloadable in the browser window. Seems to work okay at home (at least once) so Apple MM support has declared not their problem. As for my companies IT support professionals... I'm sure they tell me I should have bought a Blackberry. Regardless, I was mistaken about iTunes and I thank you for your help. I'll might continue this on the Mobile Me forum.

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