Scott Dorman

I have read conflicting reports as to whether Outlook Connector allows synchronization between Windows Live Calendar (with a paid Live Hotmail Plus membership) and Outlook. Can you confirm whether this functionality exists and, if it does not, suggest an alternative method for sync'g a web-based calendar with Outlook?

Currently, the Outlook Connector does not allow synchronization between Live Calendar and Outlook, even with a paid Live Hotmail Plus account. If you have a paid MSN subscription, you can synchronize.

However, that will be changing in the very near future. As I indicated in the blog post, Microsoft is internally testing a new beta release of the Outlook Connector that will support calendar synchronization, without requiring a paid subscription.

Any idea on when this Outlook Connector will be released to the public? I just signed up for a MSN Premium account but it only synchronizes my calendar with the "old" hotmail calendar, not the new live calendar.

any information on this would be great..

Best they find a solution soon as google are already a few steps ahead of them

I have heard that the calendar synchronization is coming soon. Has anyone else heard anything? Our adminstrator will not put in an exchange server, so I will not switch to Outlook until the synchronization is available. I have to stick with WL calendar and WL mail.

@Eddie, @Ferdinand, @Grant: I haven't heard a timeframe yet, but hopefully soon.

I just bought a new PC with vista. They did not load it with outlook and I had to buy another download which came today
from Circit City. Now I find I still cannot syn with my HP PDA. What gives? With my senior moments I need this. I wish I had my XP back again. My new 22" monitor still has no sound and goes to sleep constantly. My calls to circuit city help do no good. These comments will appear on the internet. I am one angry and frustrated 79 year old lady.

Comments on two topics.

First is regarding our beloved Outlook Connector.

So we have a Windows Live Essentials Subscription which grants us currently 50, but shortly 100 mailboxes, all of which have email, calendar, tasks and contacts (let's call these services)

Upon installation of Outlook Connector (we are using Outlook 2007), syncrhonization works between ALL services.

It is a bit sluggish at times, and things show up when you least expect them i.e. not directly after a synch, but basically seems to work.

Except, we have just a couple of the accounts that do not work this way - and regardless of what we do the Calendar will just not synch, but contacts will. Go figure.

Contacted MSFT support via email and they tried to be helpful but had conflicting directions as to how to resolve the issues.

All have said remove the Connector since it is included in Outlook 2007.

However, this is neither apparent, and when configuring an email box to connect to the Live service, it then just only replicates email and nothing else will synch.

So, reinstalled the connector and all works again, except for the previoulsly mentioned users.

Need time on the phone with the MSFT support guys to figure this out which I will do when I have time and post something back here.

Second comment:

This relates to the other poor fellow who is trying to get his prior generation HD PDA to work with Vista.

Firstly you need to install the new Windows Mobile Device Center since this is required to synch all devices in Vista (ActiveSync is no longer used, nor will it install).

USB synch works very simply with that installed - had no problems with it at all.

Challenge comes when you try to use bluetooth. Basically versions of Windows Mobile prior to version 6 expect ActiveSynch at the other end and request a COM port for connection (it is virtual through the bluetooth call) and looks in the registry for an entry called 'SerialPort' that has COMx as its value and where X is the inbound COM Port Number.

Unfortunately Vista simply has SerialPort set to 'Bluetooth' and so your device is never able to connect (does not find the service running on the Vista machine it needs to talk to)

So you need a bunch of guts, launch RegEdit, search for SerialPort in the Local Keys, and edit it to replace 'BlueTooth' with your COM port number (you can find the right one in the Bluetooth options tabs under COM Ports.

Set that, save it and away you go.

If you have the later version of Windows Mobile Device Center installed, you can configure this in the Device Center itself.

Challenge is that the COM ports increment in numbers every time you either connect to a different USB port by mistake, or are forced to reconfigure the partnership.

So, scrap the HP PDA, get the new HTC TyTN II smart phone (seriously the most integrated advice with Vista and is a great phone) and you are all set.

Hope that helps a little.

The new Outlook Connector Beta is great, especially syncing all the new calendars.

But it has one major drawback: Since installing it, I can't sync outlook calendar with my smartphone anymore!

Since windows live for mobile can't sync the calendar, I use wlfm to sync mails and contacts, outlook connector to sync the live calendar to outlook, and synced my smartphone calendar with outlook.

This does not work anymore, so far I found no way to sync my smartphone calendar with outlook since outlook connector beta 12.1!!! :(

I also need sync calendar of my mobile device with live calendar!!!!
Is there a good news?

Has anyone been able to sync their mobile with live calendar. I believe it something to do with the calendar is on an ost file and not a pst.

i need help. i recently installed the new beta outlook connector. my email, & contacts syn just fine, but i can't get the connector to syn any of my saved appt from my live account. someone pls advise.

I believe this is a known problem between the Outlook Connector and mobile sync. I haven't heard of any resolution to this yet.

I'm using Outlook 2003 with the latest version of the Connector and I was wondering if there was a way of excluding my Hotmail email from the sync? I really just want the calendar to sync as the email keeps timeing out...

Thanks,

Matt

I haven't tried it yet (since it's still in beta), but as long as the new Outlook Connector really does support calendar synchronization, I'll be happy. But since Outlook Connector's real purpose is to synchronize with Live/Hotmail, why don't they just add Calendar synchronization to Windows Live for Windows Mobile (or at least do that also)? I originally tried and struggled with Outlook Connector for a long time (and didn't like it, but didn't have much choice). Then someone told me about Windows Live for Windows Mobile, and I loved it. It was much easier and didn't involve a middle-man like Outlook and Outlook Connector.

First why it will not work:

Calendaring is the sole feature Outlook offers. This is why calendaring will not tie in well with their other email services offered by Microsoft. Meaning if they remove the bugs why would anyone buy Outlook? Given that I understand their business justification for not making a sync tool and their other tools buggy in calendaring, but it does not mean I have to agree with it.

My Solution (but might not be yours):

I post it to gmail and made that public so I coud post it else where. To find your solution you must ask yourself what is the real goal in your wanting synchronization. The google solution took about 15 minutes to find it and post it on a site, but that might not be your goal.

Hope this helps in advising you to look into other solutions.

Perhaps you can help me. I have a premium MSN account. Microsoft is telling me that to synch the calendar, I must use 12.1 Outlook connector. To synch notes I must use 12.0. Neither works.
Can you tell me how to get copies of my email, contacts, notes, and calendar to stay in a file on my computer so that I can dump all of this and use something else? Redoing all of this gives me the shivers.
Thanks!

Why?
Backup = Open outlook > click on File menu > Data File Management > click on Personal Folders > click Open Folder > Copy the file selected (Paste it somewhere)

Export = Open outlook > click on File menu > Import and Export > Export to file > click Next > Microsoft Excel > select the folder you want to copy like Notes > Next > Next > Finish
(Calendar you lose some features like reoccurrences or out of date range)

With out knowing purpose it is hard to give you a better answer. Remember you can sync to Gmail and then subscribe to Gmail from most other services such as MSN.

Problem:
Can't sync calendar, contacts, etc... with a Windows Live Account (i.e. hotmail, msn. etc...) that has been configured to sync with Outlook on your desktop. This problem occurs because your WL account is not the "default" account and Active Sync only tries to sync your device with the default account.

Solution:
In order to sync a WinMo device with an account in Outlook that was set up using Outlook Connector via ActiveSync on a computer running Windows XP follow these steps:

1) Open Outlook
2) Go to Tools > Email accounts
3) Select the radio button for "view or change existing accounts"
4) Click Next
5) In the Email Accounts window open the drop down menu "deliver new email to the following location"
6) Select the account you want to sync your mobile device with
7) Click Finish
8) A dialog comes up stating something about the default folders changing (I don't quite remember the whole message)
9) Accept the message
10) You can now sync your mobile device with outlook and also still have the changes sync up to your WL account that you configured using Outlook Connector.

Had been using Outlook 2002, Outlook Connector, Live Messanger and MSN Mail account. All (Mail, Contacts, Calendar, etc...) stayed in Synch. Several weeks ago I received message whenever I started Outlook taht I needed to download new Outlook Connector. When it tried it failed because it was no longer backward compatable with Outlook 2002. Intsalled Office/Outlook 2007 now I can synch mail and contacts but not the Calendars. I have tried removing and setting up a new account but it does not help. Keep receiving message in Outlook Server Status that it cannot connect with Live Messenger.

Any thoughts?

I have the same problem as Rich C. I upgraded from OL 2003 to 2007. Everything went well short of the calendar. I tried everything I could think of including removing the sync program and downloading and reinstalling. It allowed me to repair the original which tells me that it didn't fully uninstall... that urks me. Anyhow... Any clues? Much appreciate any help.

Just found my answer in the help files:
Learn why Calendar status is "Error"
Calendar synchronization with Outlook is a paid subscription-only feature. When you subscribe to Windows Live Hotmail, you get to synchronize notes and tasks as well as your calendar. If you are using the Outlook Connector with a free Windows Live Hotmail account, you will see an alert on the Outlook Connector toolbar. When you click Server Status the following appears:

Calendar : Error

Way to go MS! I really do hate them.

I have a paid Windows Live Hotmail account, and was still getting a "Calendar status is Error" error synching with Outlook Connector (which seemed to also make it unable to synch anything more than once without restarting Outlook). I finally went to my Windows Live calendar (which I don't use) and set the timezone, and now I can synch everything, multiple times!

Syncing the calendar with Outlook 2010 and the new connector works flawlessly. Even for non-paid accounts ;)

Great job MSFT :)

in xp i can see my windows live calendar dates show up in outlook today but in win 7 not so only shjows info in default calendar any ideas out there