Help Push email broken since 2.3.5/Sense 3.0 update

[jdmmps]

Have tried this for about 3.5 days now. 98% of emails seem to sync fine in both directions. With the 2% not working correctly, however this only affecting items I have read on my computer that do not update on the phone. Are you guys guys getting similar numbers/stats to those ive mentioned? HTC should have tested this core functionality before releasing an update.

 

[locomite]

98% of emails seem to sync fine in both directions. With the 2% not working correctly, however this only affecting items I have read on my computer that do not update on the phone.

For the first day, 100% sync success in both directions, then overnight or the following day, it goes back to useless, where pretty much all changes made on the PC don't push to the phone.

 

[jester6581]

Hi.

I had the same problem and after a tip from our technicians the issue is now gone for a week. They told me to do the following steps:
1. delete the exchange account on my phone, then;
2. delete the phone from exchange through Outlook Web Access (OWA) (Options>Mobile) and then;
3. recreate the exchange account on the phone.

Appearantly something went wrong in the relationship between the phone and the Exchange server side.

I guess that if you don't have access to OWA in step 2, you should call your service desk so they can do this for you.

Hope this helps.
Sander

 

[B Bill M]

As folks continue to post on this thread it shows that HTC has a problem that affects many of us.

Relating to the the latest few suggestions, I tried all of that including jester6581's advice to delete the account on the server as well and while things sometimes seem ok for a short while, it always went back to not syncing properly.

I'm now using Touchdown for email and contacts but still the built in exchange sync for calendar and contacts. I don't like the calendar that's part of Touchdown which is why I still use the HTC built in sync for that so I can use a calendar app. I can confirm that Touchdown does what it says on the tin, unlike the HTC Exchange client.

Touchdown cost

 

[locomite]

1. delete the exchange account on my phone, then;
2. delete the phone from exchange through Outlook Web Access (OWA) (Options>Mobile) and then;
3. recreate the exchange account on the phone.

This didn't work for me. The problem was back for me in about 30 mins or so after doing this...

 

[jester6581]

Hi.

I had the same problem and after a tip from our technicians the issue is now gone for a week. They told me to do the following steps:
1. delete the exchange account on my phone, then;
2. delete the phone from exchange through Outlook Web Access (OWA) (Options>Mobile) and then;
3. recreate the exchange account on the phone.

Appearantly something went wrong in the relationship between the phone and the Exchange server side.

I guess that if you don't have access to OWA in step 2, you should call your service desk so they can do this for you.

Hope this helps.
Sander

It seems I was to quick with the above message... A few hours after posting it, two items on my phone remained in the inbox, while they were already removed from my desktop mailbox (outlook). And now there are even more messages on my phne which are removed from outlook.
Sorry...

 

[plesbit]

At last!

It's sad how dependent we become on technology but I rely on my Desire S for pretty much everything - both my personal (Google) and my professional (Exchange) contacts, calendar entries and emails sync onto the phone so it is pretty much a one-stop life device for me.

Unfortunately, like everyone here the upgrade to Sense 3.0 screwed up the Exchange ActiveSync side in a variety of ways - the most annoying of which is syncing any changes to mail not made on the phone itself. The changes don't push. There are other problems too where sync of other kinds (typically calendar events) don't sync and get locked into a continuous loop of endlessly syncing which, if not spotted early, can chew through your entire battery in just a few hours. That is fixable though (as long as you notice) but the non-syncing of email renders email almost unusable on the phone.

Like others I've been through the whole ping pong with HTC support who flatly denied my suggestion that it was a bug they'd introduced with Sense 3.0 because they said other people would be reporting the same problem if that was the case and no-one was. Tried the whole wiping the account, tried with other accounts (same server) and so on but nothing made any difference and HTC eventually stopped responding to me when I pointed out all the Apple, HP, Asus, Samsung devices we have that don't have this problem.

Our company mobile provider (who are probably reading this now as I've sent them the link - hello Maxine) have been excellent and replaced my original Desire S with another one which came with Sense 3.0 from new (the previous one was upgraded from 2.x) but the same problem exists. In fact it's worse as the other one could be periodically fooled into doing a full inbox refresh that corrected any mistakes but the same tricks don't work on this one. Perhaps that's the difference between an upgraded phone and one that came with Sense 3.0 from new?

Pity really - it should be such a good device if it only worked as designed. Interestingly though, our mobile provider, since I raised the issue, have been trying to recreate the problem with Sense 3.0 handsets on their own Exchange server and can't find a problem which made me wonder whether it was to do with specific builds of Exchange?

 

[plesbit]

Okay, found some new info this evening. I don't know if this is of help to anybody but it's always worth collecting info.

As we know, any changes made to messages in Outlook are not pushed to the handset and manual refreshes etc make no difference. In my case, at least, the same does NOT happen with contacts and calendar entries which always sync properly, only email.

Now as well as using my Outlook client on my work computer I also connect to my work email using my home computer. However at home I connect using IMAP. What I discovered this evening is that any changes I make on the server using my IMAP connection ALWAYS sync to the handset. So whatever is behind this problem it is something to do with the Exchange connection between the the Outlook client and the server - changes made using an IMAP connection are recognised by the handset.

In fact, on the back of this I was able to clear up my inbox on the handset. I simply moved ALL my messages out to another folder and forced a re-sync on the handset. Any messages still showing were therefore errors, I deleted the lot of them, and then moved all the messages back again (via IMAP).

So there is obviously something specific in the way the client and server communicate using Exchange protocols that the handset doesn't understand as the same problem does not exist when changes to the messages are made using an IMAP protocol. This might be a good time to compile a list of the server / client build versions to see if there is a pattern. I'll go first:

Server: Exchange 2010 (sorry, exact build unknown at this time but I'll check tomorrow)
Client: Microsoft Outlook 2010, locally installed but licensed via Office 365 (Office Professional Plus to be exact).

As an aside, I've tried installing the Touchdown app suggested earlier and find it a thoroughly good app which has no problems syncing changes made in Outlook through the Exchange protocol. However I can't figure out how it works - is it using ActiveSync or is it installing its own version of ActiveSync and using that instead? Pushed mail comes up with separate notifications which are sometimes faster, sometimes slower than the generic install. It only deals strictly with Exchange which, on the one hand is useful because it means I can look at my work contacts and calendars without the clutter of my personal stuff but on the other hand lacks the advantage of the integrated view which I rely on heavily to ensure I don't book personal stuff which conflicts with professional stuff and vice versa. I therefore will have to continue to have the generic account configured to sync (though I can turn off the specific sync on email to ensure I don't get two notifications every time I get an email). I'm also concerned that if there are two systems running in parallel essentially doing the same job that resources and battery life will take a hit as a result....

 

[erik83]

I am having the exact same problem as described by JohnWP in the first post.

That is, mail sync does not work properly after the Android 2.3.5/Sense 3.0 update. When reading, deleting, moving e-mails on my Outlook desktop client, they remain unchanged on my mobile device.

My phone is a HTC Desire HD. Using the HTC stock mail app/widget, and intend to do so. I have done a factory reset and tried all other "solutions" in this thread without any success.

I have contacted HTC about the problem and waiting for a response.

 

[erik83]

I just spoke with a person from HTC Sweden.

She said they are aware of the problem and are working on a fix in form of an update. The update will be released OTA when it is available. Of course, the response to my question "When?" was "As soon as possible" without any more specific details.

I would guess anything between 1-4 months if you'd ask me.

This sucks.

 

[jsmithy1]

Tell you what, this might not be a problem limited to syncing with Exchange. I've noticed recently that emails don't seem to be getting pushed through and I'm using just Hotmail with the standard HTC Mail app...

Thought it might have been the fault of Juice Defender, but having switched that off seems the app still needs a prod to remind it that it's supposed to check for new email every 15 minutes during the day.

 

[wibbly]

Only workaround (hardly a workaround) I've found is to disable push completely! If I set no syncs except "sync on open" the email sync, at least, works/seems relaible. Of course the usage model is pull then

 

[TommyG995]

Hi all,

After reading the thread i tried to combine two solutions as mentioned earlier above. Things are working out for me right now (as in the last half hour

Took the following steps:

1. Remove all exchange accounts from the phone
2. Disable "fast boot" found under the power settings
3. Go to applications -> all apps -> Mail -> Clear Data
4. Shut down phone.
5. Go to outlook web access, select options -> mobile -> tab mobile phones and REMOVE ( the X-icon) the phone which is yours.
6. reboot your phone
7. configure your exchange account, just like before
8. configure your push mail like you were used to.

hope this helps, i have tested it by deleting a mail in my outlook and then synching my phone, and the other way around.

good luck

 

[locomite]

1. Remove all exchange accounts from the phone
2. Disable "fast boot" found under the power settings
3. Go to applications -> all apps -> Mail -> Clear Data
4. Shut down phone.
5. Go to outlook web access, select options -> mobile -> tab mobile phones and REMOVE ( the X-icon) the phone which is yours.
6. reboot your phone
7. configure your exchange account, just like before
8. configure your push mail like you were used to.

I tried this combination a few weeks ago and got the usual 'works for a while then goes back to not syncing properly' so I suspect you'll see issues again within 24-48 hours...

 

[plesbit]

I'm slightly surprised by the recent posts on this thread. Let me bullet point what we've found:

• Surely we've established by now that deleting the accounts, wiping the phone etc makes it work for a few hours at best and then the problem comes back.
• We've also established that the problem seems to be with the HTC mail client and not with ActiveSync since third party mail apps do not suffer the same issue.
• Furthermore I have even demonstrated that the problem seems to occur only when using an Exchange connection between Outlook and the server and not when using an IMAP connection between Outlook and server.
• I have even suggested that we pool information about the Outlook and Exchange versions we are using to see if we can see a pattern but that seems have been ignored completely.

Are we trying to gather information about this problem or would people just prefer keep doing their own thing in isolation?

I wholly support the idea that HTC should fix their email client and big thumbs up to the person that managed to get them to admit they know about it and will fix in due course - that alone is a big step forward. I don't want to use a 3rd party email client as I am finding the whole thing a faff but it's certainly better than just having an inbox full of stuff that shouldn't be there.

I am pushing through various suppliers to get a direct line to an HTC engineer and bypass the front of house support whose main job seems to be to deny all knowledge and suggest things I've already tried countless times.... fingers crossed!

 

[B Bill M]

I think you're being a bit harsh on some of the posters here, plesbit. It's true some folks haven't given any indication of their software versions but some have. I (as stated in an earlier post) switched from Exchange Server 2007 to 2010 which made no difference whatsoever to the issue.

I don't think the pc client is relevant in any case, it's Exchange Server our Android phones are trying and failing to sync with, not Outlook (whatever version) or whatever other client that may be in use.

I'd be interested (if anyone could confirm) to know if Android without the HTC mail client suffers as we do.

Refering to an earlier comment, I am using Touchdown only for email for precicely the reason stated - so that I can still use the built in applications for calendar & contacts. I have the Android client set to update every hour during the day whereas Touchdown, syncing email (& contacts for email usage) is set to push. It's not the ideal solution but it seems to work for me and I haven't noticed any hit on battery life having the two syncing processes going on.

 

[AlanRB]

We're using Desire S phones with 2.3.5 activesync 12.1, Exchange server 2010 is with Microsoft Office365, exhibiting the same sync issues as everyone else. The same phones were working ok with Microsoft BPOS, Exchange server 2007, until the forced transition to Office365 this month. Microsoft say that it is a phone problem and quote "... an issue with the Exchange ActiveSync on the phones. It does not adhere closely enough to the EAS protocol and is not completely compatible with Exchange 2010 ...."

 

[wibbly]

"... an issue with the Exchange ActiveSync on the phones. It does not adhere closely enough to the EAS protocol and is not completely compatible with Exchange 2010 ...."

Yup. And particularly galling that the HTC client before the one used in 2.3.5 seemed to have got this right :-(

 

[Mennojd]

I had the same problem with my HTC Desire HD. I also have Android 3.2.5 with HTC sense 3.0 and Exchange 2010. It was working fine with Exchange 2010 before I upgraded my phone so it is definitely related to the HTC mail client in this firmware version.

I did get a workable workaround from 1 of my colleagues though. Change the number of days to synchronize from (default) 3 to All (everything).
From the mail client go to settings/send and receive/download past mail and select All. Now e-mails are synchronizing fine again

 

[lng]

Hi All,

I'm using a Desire HD from Telus in Vancouver, Canada. I just got my 2.3.5 / 3.0 Sense UI update OTA near the end of January, and I'm experiencing the same sync issue with Mail (messages read / filed / deleted on my computer still show as unread on my phone) and though that has been galling, it has not been debilitating. My bigger issue is with Calendar - appointments created on Outlook do not consistently sync with HTC Calendar, and vice versa events created on HTC Calendar are not showing up on my Outlook calendar.

I'm trying the suggestion above for mail, but would love any input on workarounds for Calendar. I'm on my 30 day trial period for Touchdown but I find the Calendar uglier and harder to work with than the native HTC app. You can't open your appointments to view details or edit except for on "Agenda" view, and so viewing or modifying any appointments farther in the future than today are a massive pain in the ass.

If anyone can figure out how to go back to the previous stable build, I'd love to hear it. It's my work phone so this is a problem I have to resolve. I've emailed HTC support in Canada but so far the response has been regarding HTC sync, and I've indicated that I'm not syncing from my computer. I'll report back if and when I get a better response.

Thanks so much in advance for all the generous knowledge sharing.

 

[lng]

I'm copying the last response I received from HTC:

Thank you for your reply regarding synchronization of your HTC Desire HD device from TELUS with your Microsoft Exchange account.

I know the importance of synchronizing your phone with your Exchange account. I have forwarded your email to the appropriate department.

Our Mail application is generally updated when we release a software update, so the application may no longer be fully compatible with your Exchange account

It appears that your device may be experiencing a compatibility issue with Exchange 2010 following the update. I recommend you continue using the

 

[wibbly]

I did get a workable workaround from 1 of my colleagues though. Change the number of days to synchronize from (default) 3 to All (everything).
From the mail client go to settings/send and receive/download past mail and select All. Now e-mails are synchronizing fine again

Working here so far but it's not been long... Anyone know this workaround to fail in the end?

 

[Mennojd]

Working here so far but it's not been long... Anyone know this workaround to fail in the end?

Yup, it does. I spoke to soon....
Some mails still get stuck in the phone after a while. You can get it working again by changing the number of days to synchronize. It actually makes no difference what you select, just that you change the setting.

Workable, but still annoying.

 

[wibbly]

Yup, it does. I spoke to soon....
Some mails still get stuck in the phone after a while. You can get it working again by changing the number of days to synchronize. It actually makes no difference what you select, just that you change the setting.

Workable, but still annoying.

Does it help if you also tick the option to make it sync on open?

 

[locomite]

Does it help if you also tick the option to make it sync on open?

No. I have that option ticked but still experience the issue.