iCloud and Windows 8.1

Apple never chimes in it seems when there are issues with competitors, especially Windows.

Anyway, I'm an avid user of Windows 8 and everytime there is an update, it seems to corrupt the iCloud Control Panel.

What I do each and every time, including after installing the new Windows 8.1 update, is this:

1. Close out Outlook,

2. Go to Control Panel and uninstall iCloud,

3. Restart Computer,

4. When computer restarts, open Outlook. Go to File, Options, Add Ins and make sure the "iCloud Outlook Add-in" doesn't appear anywhere. Now click OK, and click Calendars. Under your calendars, you will still see iCloud but if you select it, nothing will happen especially the error message everyone is speaking of.

5. Close Outlook,

6. Download the latest iCloud Control Panel (as of today, it's 3.0),

7. Follow all the prompts.

8. Sign in to iCloud and go through the set-up. Make sure to select ALL when downloading from the Cloud, and NOT Some!

9. Open Outlook.

10. All your contacts and appointments should magically appear.

This simple 5 minute fix should work for everyone.

Hope this helps!

That probably would've worked! Didn't even try signing out!

I just reinstalled iCloud and that worked.

Thanks for everyone's posts. It really helped me.

hh

I did it differently thanks to reading all of this. Before I updated from Windows 8 to 8.1, I:

1. Uninstalled iCloud panel, made sure that Outlook File/Options/Adds Ins and Accounts had no reference to iCloud (which they did not after uninstalling iCloud Panel.

2. Rebooted (which may not have been nessaary, went to Windows Store and download Windows 8.1. Took awhile to download and install.

3. Installed iCloud panel (3.0 was the latest version available). Followed the prompts for its installation which include rebooting the computer.

4. I selected "All" when downloading iCloud. However, contacts, calendar and tasks did not immediately connect.

5. I went back to iCloud panel which gave me the message that contacts, calendar and tasks had not fully completed, and I responded to proceed.

6. My contacts, calendar and tasks reappeared in Outlook.

There is a complete set of solutions described here: iCloud no longer syncs with Outlook after updating to Windows 8.1

The bottom line is that there is no one single solution which will work in all cases.

In my case, I had to unsync my iCloud data from Outlook, Sign out from the iCloud Control Panel, sign back in, and re-sync.

In my case, unchecking/rechecking the items from the iCloud Control panel DID NOT do the trick, nor did re-syncing. Maybe that was necessary but the automatic iCloud sync with Outlook contacts and calendar was ultimately fixed when I reactivated the iCloud Outlook Add-in as mentioned in one of the posts above. I didn't have to uninstall the iCloud Control Panel. Maybe Windows automatically disables the add-in after the upgrading to 8.1?

Anyway, to reactivate the iCloud Outlook Add-in:

1. Open Outlook (I'm using Outlook 2010)

2. Click on Options->Add-Ins

3. Check to see if iCloud Outlook Add-in is listed under 'Inactive Applications Add-ins'. If it's not there or not even under Active Applications Add-ins then you need to probably reinstall iCloud Control panel

4. Click "Go..." beside Manage: COM Add-ins

5. Check 'iCloud Outlook Add-in' then click OK

After that you'll notice that there will appear an 'iCloud' menu tab in Outlook.

I see this problem intermittently, but I just click the Contacts - iCloud" button again and I see the contacts. What is annoying is that one must clear whatever this error condition is before a sync will work for Contacts. This is one of the many things broken in the iOS - Outlook combination, as detailed at http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/ca3191f4-2c1e-4b52-a563-177877a 89ee8/is-outlook-icloud-syncing-hopelessly-kludgy?forum=outlook

sorry to sound really stupid but where is the icloud control panel and how do you sign in and out of icloud. I cant get there from here. . .

No I'm on windows that synced to my iphone/clouds and erased my airmac right now. Just found who hacked me.