Windows Mobile 6 / ActiveSync / Outlook

tonybro · 10-04-2007, 01:30 PM

This is just a reminder post for those people drooling over/looking at the new devices coming along and thinking that would be nice!

A fair percentage of the new devices are coming with Windows Mobile 6 - Hooray!

Windows Mobile 6 requires ActiveSync V4.5 (or later - depending on when you read this!)

ActiveSync V4.5 requires Microsoft Outlook 2002 or later which shouldn't be a major problem as most devices over recent years came with MS Outlook 2002.

And all is well so far with Microsoft's view of the world!

However!

If you are in a corporate environment where you may not have control over your desktop/laptop build - beware!

I came across this today in that a device I am about to review has WM6 on it but our corporate build of PC has MS Outlook 2000. Have you spotted the issue yet?

Yes, I can't synchronise this device with my corporate PC, which incidentally is the one I need to sync with more than my home PC....

Now, I can't truly blame Microsoft, nor my internal IT team but it effectively means I have to use an older device (WM5) that can sync with ActiveSync V4.2 and Outlook 2000 and then sync the WM6 device at home where I have all the requisite software installed!

The price of progress!!!

Happy synchronising all!

cyclist · 10-04-2007, 02:30 PM

Have you actually tried it? Active Sync 4.5 says it requires Outlook 2002. After I'd been using 4.5 for a couple of weeks I realised that I'm still using Outlook 2000. I'd never upgraded Outlook, on the it's not broken so don't fix it principle. And as ActiveSync 4.5 continues to work with Outlook 2002, I'm going to leave things alone.
Now my device is WM5, not WM6, so it might be different for you, but it might not.

tonybro · 10-04-2007, 03:58 PM

Hi Cyclist,

Yes I was using the ActiveSync V4.5 Beta2 with Outlook 2000 and no issues.

Upgraded ActiveSync on my Laptop to V4.5 when it went live, knowing the requirements stated OL2002 or later and it failed to establish a connection....

Rolling AS back to V4.2 cured the Sync problem but now I have this WM6 device I'm back on the roundabout....

I think I will try the V4.5 Beta again to see if that can be used with WM6/OL2000

Oh the joys Microsoft foister upon us!

cyclist · 10-04-2007, 04:32 PM

Hmm. I'm using a 4.5 beta from a day or two before 4.5 final was released, so I'd assumed they would be the same. But it seems not!

irblinx · 10-04-2007, 05:40 PM

that's a bit of a blow mate, have your IT peops got any upgrade plans?

fowljr · 10-04-2007, 08:59 PM

That's still one up on me Tony, our corporate personal firewall on all laptops stops activesync working at all!

tonybro · 11-04-2007, 10:35 AM

Right, I played with this last night....

Corporate laptop has just been rebuilt going from Win2000 to WinXP (with restrictions).

When on Win2000 I had OL2000 and AS4.5Beta2 and all was fine.

On receiving the laptop back with XP, I installed AS4.5 knowing it stated it didn't support OL2000 and as this was a clean installation of AS (no previous installations existed) the sync with both my Orbit and Exec failed.

So I downgraded to AS4.2 and the syncronisation resumed.

I am trying to review a WM6 device and it requires AS4.5 but I knew if i installed it my Orbit and Exec would fail syncs again. Dilema.

However, not to be detered, I went for an installation of AS4.5 over the 4.2 installation and it appears to be working!!

As far as I can make out, a clean install of 4.5 with OL2000 will not work BUT and upgrade to 4.5 from 4.2 appears to retain support for OL2000....

Oh well....

I now have OL2000, AS4.5, WM5 & 6 devices syncing on XP.....

tonybro · 11-04-2007, 10:38 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by irblinx";p=&quot

that's a bit of a blow mate, have your IT peops got any upgrade plans?

If they have Ian, your guess would be as good as mine!!!

As we are on XP, Office97, OL2000 and Exchange Server 2000, if they did have upgrade plans it wouldn't be to anything recent....

cyclist · 11-04-2007, 12:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tonybro";p=&quot

However, not to be detered, I went for an installation of AS4.5 over the 4.2 installation and it appears to be working!!

As far as I can make out, a clean install of 4.5 with OL2000 will not work BUT and upgrade to 4.5 from 4.2 appears to retain support for OL2000....

Interesting! My install of AS4.5 beta was over AS3.9 which was already syncing with Outlook 2000. I wonder if it needs not only installing AS4.5 over a previous version of AS, but also to have previously synched that older version with Outlook 2000.

windows · 11-04-2007, 05:43 PM

Glad you got the problem liked Tony.

Did the ROM upgrade go okay?