Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Resolve Contacts Sync Error in iTunes

I've encountered an error today where I was unable to sync any contacts on my iPhone 3G back to my computer. I'm currently running iTunes v7.7.1.11 on a Win XP Pro SP3.

The info tab in iTunes is where the contacts, calendar, mail, etc are synced. In this tab, I couldn't select any option at all for all the drop-down boxes, and any attempts to tick the checkboxes in that tab will result in an error. It kept giving me an error where it is unable to load provider data from Sync Services.

The problem is that I believe some of the data files used by iTunes for the Sync Services were corrupted. To resolve this sync error in iTunes, just do the following:
  1. Quit your iTunes
  2. Goto |drive|\Documents and Settings\|user name|\Application Data\Apple Computer\SyncServices\Local in your Windows Explorer
  3. Make a backup of the contents of this folder (optional)
  4. Remove everything in this folder. If you encounter a permission error, open your Task Manager, and look under the Processes tab. End Process for the SyncServer. After that, you should be able to remove everything in that folder.
  5. Connect your iPhone 3G to your computer and run iTunes

That's it... I was able to re-sync everything from my iPhone 3G after this. You can remove the backup done in step 3 if everything is successful.

Hope this helps...

14 comments:

Andrew said...

Thanks. Yes, it helped :)

chantc said...

Glad that its of help. :)

Rich said...

Great, that error msg was really bugging me. Took me while to find my appdata folder. Now everything works Thanks VERY Much

chantc said...

For a simpler way to find your appdata folder, just go to Start > Run and type iexplore %appdata%

This works on Win XP Pro

Anonymous said...

i also encounter the same problem..but i'm using Windows XP SP2 and this method doesnt work for me.. i couldnt find the sync services folder..any help?

chantc said...

Try doing the following:
- Goto Start > Run
- Type iexplore %appdata% (a folder should appear)

You should be able to see the Apple Computer folder. Just follow the post above.

Unknown said...

Thx a lot! It works!

Anonymous said...

thank you man...apple should use you as a consultant...it finally worked.

Rin 。 said...

Yes! Apple needs a consultant like you! :)

Paul Grems Duncan said...

Worked for me too. Thanks for taking the time to write the solution.

Anonymous said...

Even simpler- just end the SyncServer process in Windows Task Manager. Close iTunes. Reopen iTunes. Connect iPhone and it then works. Thanks for the tip dude.

chantc said...

Does that help? I've tried rebooting my computer (same as killing the process) the last time I had this error and it doesn't work. I have to delete the directory before everything went back to normal.

Prasad said...

Thanks a tone dude!
most simple way 2 fix this error!
thanks again

Anonymous said...

That worked for my sync error just perfectly, tywm

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