Tuesday, July 17, 2007

iPhone calendar sync woes

Paul Thurott: "It's clear that, on Windows at least (Apple's biggest market), iPhone sync is horribly broken. Regardless of the supported Windows or Office version you use, the iPhone will only sync with the single default local calendar in Outlook, and not with any other calendars, be they local or Internet-based. This is a problem for a number of reasons, but the most damning is that calendar sync with multiple calendars (local, Internet, whatever) actually works fine with a normal iPod." I don't own an iPhone (River does) but the fact that I don't have a Mac (and she does) was a factor in my decision. As for what Paul considers superior performance on the iPod, remember that you can't update the calendar on an iPod. I'm not surprised that Apple's one-way sync works better or is more capable. Two-way sync is hard (though necessary).

14 comments:

garret said...

I sync my Mac's iCal with Outlook using Plaxo and get all my events into my iPhone that way. Works great!

Anonymous said...

I love my iPhone but the fact that it only syncs with the default calendar is driving me crazy. iTunes even has a dialog box for you to designate which calendar to sync with but it is grey and can not be used. Apple needs to get this fixed ASAP.

Anonymous said...

wow. thanks to the guy above who mentioned plaxo. works pretty good so far.. :)

Anonymous said...

Just bought an iPhone and have a sickening feeling I have made a huge mistake. The default synchronisation of the calendar looks like I may just throw the phone away.

Unknown said...

If you think it sucks to use Outlook, try using iCal! No - I am not serious - it sucks too. Spinning icons, active-looking greyed-out buttons, no changes to your calendar whatsoever - but you discover that only when you miss an appointment and start WONDERING about all that spinning and greying and actually look into the situation. Oops! no Sync?
You HAVE made a huge mistake in buying an iPhone - we all have. What a total disappointment.

Anonymous said...

Well. Buy a mac. Works great for me. ;-)

Unknown said...

or get a Moto Q, that's a whole lot better (sarcastic cackle). but seriously even taking the itunes flaws into account it's still far surpasses anything else. Why don't you use that paperweight you call a noggin to just the most logical solution...

Anonymous said...

Worse still, try moving an appointment on either outlook or your iphone and watch what happens.

Today's quirk is that it deleted both times from outlook, but kept both on my iphone. Bad enough in itself but it takes a different approach every time!!

Why, oh why cant it just put up a list of calendar differences and ask me which one i want to keep???

Kevin

Anonymous said...

did you say, "Buy a Mac"?
well buddy how about Get a Life.
Post a solution or GTFO.

Anonymous said...

There seems to be a number of problems with iPhone and Outlook syncing. Just today I noticed that my iPhone had deleted all individual entries from a month and back ago

Anonymous said...

...for two way sync between iphone and google calendar, buy an iphone app called Saisuke( red one). On set up, configure saisuke to update every hour. Replace Iphone iCal app with Saisuke and use this. It cost me 9.99 but well worth a few bucks to know that my appointments are where I want them on both iPhone and google. Fast sync, Enjoy!

Anonymous said...

Yeah, buy a Mac... Crash differently! LOL, sad sad people.

Unknown said...

I hate the iphone's 1 way sync with only 1 calendar !
I want to
-add personal items manually onto my iphone cal
- sync with my work's outlook calendar
- dont want the personal items to be transferred to my work outlook !!
- I could do it with the treo !!
_ used sai suke..but cant have the calendar available offline..and takes too long to load !

Unknown said...

see,, how to sync outlook with iphon and outlook mail is on your iphone..

http://www.phonesappstabs.com/how-to-setup-outlook-email-on-ipad-or-iphone/

click it,,,
hope it helps you..