HTC One M9 Contacts Sync not working

[tarekahf]

Problem: Google Contacts Sync not working. No error. It is not syncing since Feb 26, 2017. I noticed this probelm few days ago.

I tried all the following:

1. Clear cash and data of Contact Storage, Google Contact Service, People
2. Remove/add Google Account
3. Reboot and reboot in safe mode
4. Wipe out cash partition

I am 100% sure that this problem started after I installed the HTC Software Update 4.20.631.1. I installed the software update successfully on Feb 27, 2017.

See snapshots attached with this post.

When I open Settings/Accounts and Sync, under Google, I see all is syncing fine except "Contacts". There is no sign it is syncing.

Before I removed google account and add it back, the last time sync for "Contacts" was Feb 26, 2017. So, after the software update, the contact sync failed to start. This was consistent with the status of the Contact on my phone when compared with the contact on Google from the web. I traced all last dialed numbers for all contacts and I noticed that all dialed numbers for new contacts after Feb 26, 2017, were not available on my Google Account on the web.

Please let me know how to solve this problem, and make "Contacts" sync work again.

 *Edited Labels*

[RogersZia]

Hello @tarekahf,

Welcome to the Community and thank you for posting in the Rogers Community Forums.

I appreciate all the troubleshooting steps that you've completed and listed above. Just to clarify, do you by any chance have a passcode enabled on your Google account? There's been instances where users have a passcode and that interrupts the syncing of contacts. If you do have it enabled, then you'd have to remove the passcode from your Google account settings before trying to sync your contacts. Also, have you previously been able to successfully sync your contacts from Google?

Please keep us posted on the outcome :).

RogersZia

[tarekahf]

Thank you for the reply.

I didn't setup a passcode, nor I know how to do that. Please tell me exactly how to remove it. I searched about passcode, I didn't find any relavent articles talking about passcode.

Also, I confirm 100% that before Feb 27, 2017, all contacts where being synchronized between Google Accoun and the Phone in both directions. After Feb 27, it stopped. I could verify this by tracing the last dialed numbers and the newly added contacts on the phone (to my Google Account via the People Application).

Tarek

[RogersMoin]

Hello, @tarekahf

Thank you for your patience. The passcode is applicable when you are using the 2-Step verification and it plays a role when you are not able to sign in to the Gmail app or Google account etc. 

Are you able to toggle "Sync Contacts" from Settings/Accounts/Google? It should also state the last time it was synced, what do you see for the last synced?

You can also try 'HTC Sync Manager' to sync your contacts if you are not able to enable 'Sync Contacts' in Settings of your phone.  

Cheers,

RogersMoin

PS: @Community - anybody else experiencing similar issue? Please chime in with your expertise/ideas. 

[tarekahf · Accepted solution]

Hi,

Thank you for your reply.

I am not using passcode with Google Account.

I had eventually to factory reset my phone. Now I am back with about 90% success. I lost few things suchs as:

1. I lost about less than 10 contacts. This is because I discovered the problem after one month.

2. All SMS were lost. I didn't think to back them up and they are not saved on the cloud.

3. Lost most system and app setings since the Google Drive backup used the settings of my old HTC Phone which was online. When factory reset is done, and phone restarted, it asked me to restore from HTC One. There was no option to select HTC One M9. After restore is done, I could tell that most apps came back from the old phone (HTC One).

4. HTC Theme I had before the reset was lost. Also, I could not find it nor it was restored. I looked every where on HTC Theme Store, I didn't find it. This is very annoying.

Click here to see snapshot of my HTC Theme which I lost

I will keep adding feedback to help others avoid the issues I found after factory reset.

Tarek

[tarekahf]

I will use this forum as a way to track progress after I completed factory reset.

This morning, I found also that the contact sync stopped since Yeaterday at 6:32pm.

I tried to find out what  have done since then, so I did the following (to undeo some of the settings):

1. Disabled power save.

2. Disabled WhatsApp Peek Notifications.

After that, the contact sync started working again.

In order to confirm the above, I have to repeat the test to see if the probelm will reoccur.

Tarek

[tarekahf]

Completed several tests, and confirmed that if Power Saving is on, then contact syncing won't start. Calendar sync seem to work in Power Saving mode. When I disable power saving, then contact sync will work.

Don't tell me that this was the root cause of the problem!!! So if power saving is on, then contact sync will be paused?

Tarek

[Meowmix]

Hello @tarekahf

Most likely as this feature is also on the Samsung devices too. So i guess having Power Savings on disables the contact sync.

[tarekahf]

Oh no! This is not fair... I did a factory reset...