Hi,

I'm experiencing a strange problem with my new Samsung Omnia II (WM 6.5). I have set up ActiveSync (on the cell phone) to sync e-mail, contacts, calendar and tasks with an Exchange Server. I used the same setup on my older HTC Touch Cruise (WM 6.1) and had no problems then.

The sync appears to be successful after setup, but later some e-mails are synced to the Omnia II while others are not. I have reset the device to factory settings and set up the connection again, only to experience the same thing: Success at first, then later some e-mails are received, while others are not.

How come? Any ideas anybody?

 If you leave the device for a while do the emails get there eventually? Is it something to do with the schedule of the sync out of hours?

Hi Dave,

Thank you for your quick reply. The short answer: Not the e-mails that won't sync.

Perhaps a better (although long) explanation: Let's say I leave the phone on the desk for a little while and that I receive three e-mails during that time. I can read all three e-mails on my PC (which synchronizes with the Exchange server). On some occassions, only two of the three e-mails are synced (OTA with the Exchange server) to the phone. The third e-mail cannot be synced to the phone - neither automatically nor manually.

That's why I call the problem strange - because most e-mails sync just fine, whereas some don't. The one's that sync fine, sync immediately when the e-mail is received by the Exchange server.

Best regards,
 - Tom

Further to my post yesterday:

This morning I noticed (on my phone) that I had received an e-mail. I didn't read it at the time. The next time I checked the e-mails on my phone, the one that I noticed earlier had disappeared(!) but three new e-mails had been received (these three have been available on the phone for about an hour since I noticed them, so they seem to stay put).

When I checked my e-mails on my PC, I discovered that I had actually received five e-mails, of which (as mentioned) only three are available on the phone and one was available on the phone briefly this morning and then disappeared again. Maybe the fifth e-mail was available on the phone briefly as well, but that is speculation.

 Are you using subfolders in your Inbox and using rules to push incoming email into those sub folders?

Yes, I'm using subfolders in the Inbox and a few rules to move some e-mails into some of those subfolders, but the e-mails that do not sync to the phone are not matching any rule and are still in the Inbox on my PC.

 There are a few factors that can contribute to this sort of issue. To try and get around them I'd suggest setting mail delivery at both peak and off peak times to "As items arrive". Next diasble all your automatic rules, both client and server side on the PC. Then send a few test messages to the account and see how it goes. It is worth noting that while the device will usually get emails instantly from the exchange it will often seem to take much longer to register the changes on the device where you have already or moved or deleted the items on your PC. I mean if you get an email it'll show as 1 unread on your phone. If you then view it on your PC and delete it, it'll often take a few minutes to register this change on the device. This could explain your "phantom" emails.

Thank you for your suggestions.

Mail delivery is "as items arrive" for both peak and off peak hours already. I will disable all rules and report back when I see how it goes. However, I do not have much hope as I have not changed any e-mail settings on my PC (or server) since I changed from my WM6.1 HTC (which didn't have this problem) to my new WM6.5 Samsung last week (which does have this problem).

As I was aware of the "late update when read or moved/deleted on PC" issue (contrary to immediate receive), I have deliberately not touched the problem-e-mails on the PC while trying to get them to the phone (both automatically and manually). The e-mail that showed up on the phone and then disappeared this morning did both (show up and disappear) without my touching either the phone or the PC in the mean time and without the e-mail being affected by any rule.

Anyway, I'll disable all rules and report back. I'll also put my SIM card back into the old HTC and fire it up to verify that the HTC does not have the same problem.

Hello again,

Further to the above:

I have now run with all rules turned off. I have also run with my HTC (WM6.1) in parallel with my new Samsung (WM6.5). The HTC receives all e-mails, while the Samsung still has the same problem: Some e-mails are not received on the phone, while others are.

 Hmm.....maybe it's an issue with the Samsung/WM6.5 then. It's not something I've seen reported until now though.

I guess so. I've tried to get some info from Samsung, but no response. I'm sending the phone to service.

Thanks for your time.

Still hanging on to the phone (instead of sending it for service), trying to figure out what goes on. (Sorry to bother you with this, but I've figured out a little bit more that might shed some light on the issue for those of you that understand much more about this than I do.)

The problem e-mails are actually received by my phone as long as Outlook is not running on my computer. As soon as I start Outlook on my PC, the problem e-mails disappear from the phone. The problem e-mails seem to be (mainly?) advertisement/product information e-mails from non-personal senders such as AVIS (the car hire company), The Mathworks (the mathematics application company), Farnell (online electronics components company) and so on, with lots of URLs and pictures in it. In some of these e-mails, Outlook (on the PC) will prevent downloading pictures in the e-mail - in others Outlook won't (because I've added the senders on my "safe senders list").

Further, if I (after the e-mail has disappeared from my phone) change the read/unread status of the problem e-mail back and forth on my PC (and sync it with the Exchange server) and then run a manual "send and receive" on my phone, I can see (in the status bar below the list of e-mail messages on the phone), that the phone actually processes the e-mail, but it won't display it. (If I "send and receive" again without changing the read/unread status, no such processing can be seen.)

So it appears, after all, that Outlook on the PC is involved in the problem (all rules are still off and I've even disabled the McAfee anti-spam) and that some processing (in Outlook) of the e-mail occurs, which is then synced back to the Exchange server, and which in turn prevents displaying the e-mail on the phone after the phone has again synced with the Exchange server.

However, there is also something fishy in the phone, since the disappearing of the e-mail does not occur on the HTC (with WM 6.1).

Based on this information, any new ideas, anyone?

Correction: After disabling McAfee Anti-Spam and restarting Outlook on my PC, the problem seems to be fixed (except that I don't have an operative anti-spam application on my PC anymore).

It appears, therefore, that this is a combined Outlook on Samsung Omnia II with Windows Mobile 6.5 and McAfee Anti-Spam issue. McAfee seems to do something with the e-mails that leads to the Samsung not displaying some of them. I have asked McAfee support for help on determining what goes wrong (and they are responding promptly), and I will report back with more information when I have some.

In the mean time, all suggestions are welcome.

Just to let you know (in case anyone else gets the same problem):

It's not McAfee Anti-Spam - it's the McAfee Anti-Spam E-mail Toolbar. For those of you that don't know McAfee, it has an optional toolbar that can be enabled in various e-mail clients (Outlook 2007 in my case) and that lets you manually mark (or unmark) e-mail messages as spam. When I disable the toolbar, everything is fine - when I enable it, I get the problems described above.

I've had two e-mails from Samsung. First one that told me they would have to look into the matter and get back to me (promising!). Later one that informed me on how to set up Exchange synchronisation on the phone (disappointing - I obviously already knew that).

McAfee, on the other hand, seem to be very keen on finding a solution (although the real problem seems to be in the Samsung - or WM 6.5), since their product affects the e-mail behaviour on the Samsung. They respond promptly to e-mails and even had a manager call me for half an hour to talk to me and better understand the problem. Good job, McAfee!

I'll let you know when more information emerges - particularly if a solution comes up, other than disabling the Anti-Spam Toolbar.

 Nice one, good to hear you have it kind of sorted and that McAfee are being so helpful. Fingers crossed for a fix to the Toolbar.