Word/Excel Failing Sync Translator Problems

My X5 had been mothballed for the better part of a year since I had been given a Laptop and was schlepping it around with me on my business travels. Now that I'm more or less "grounded", I've dusted off the trusty X5, hardbooted it, and am slowly reloading all of my apps and data here at work.

After transfering a number of data files, ActiveSync (3.7) reports that there are several Unresolved files -- all of which are Excel and Word files. When attempting to manually resolve these files, ActiveSync pops up the same "Conversion failed. The system cannot find the file specified" error message. When I drill down into the Conversion Settings, I find that there are NO LISTED CONVERTERS for Excel, Word, or even plain vanilla text files. The only converters shown are for bitmaps, MS Access and MS PowerPoint filetypes.

The Microsoft Knowledge base article on this (325652) points to three converters that should be loaded in the C:\Program Files\Microsoft ActiveSync folder - namely msconv97.dll, mswrd832.cnv, and richlink.dll. They're all there.

Before anyone recommends upgrading or reloading ActiveSync, I can't. The host 'puter is part of the Navy-Marine Corp Intranet (NMCI), which has pretty much locked users out of making any changes to their installed apps without an act of Congress. 3.7 was pushed onto the machine in late 2004, that's what I have to use. But even so, 3.7 worked FLAWLESSLY before I mothballed the X5.

At the moment, I'm stumped. Anyone in the Peanut Gallery have a suggestion?

[BlessidThug]

Did you try copying and pasting the files? That also triggers the AS conversion.

Thanks, but it's not that AS isn't triggering, it's that AS doesn't apparently know HOW to translate Word/Excel files. The entire list of known-to-AS file conversions is:

Device-to-Desktop:
Bitmap Image (*.2bp to *.bmp)
Bitmap Image (*.bmp to *.bmp)
Pocket Access Database (*.cdb to *.mdb)

Desktop-to-Device:
Bitmap Image (*.bmp to *.bmp)
Microsoft Access Application (*.mdb to *.cdb)
Microsoft PowerPoint Presentation (*.ppt to *.ppv)

This is from AS Options > Rules > Conversion Settings. My AS has apparently "forgotten" how to convert most of the files that it used to convert left and right, but the converters themselves (at least, according to KB 325652) are there and in the proper directory. I think my next step it to pull replacement versions of those three converters off my home PC (or extract them from my AS installation CD) and overwrite the old converters.

[Lodai]

I had a similar problem and found out that it was related to the software firewall that was installed on my work PC. Microsoft has an article that explains how to setup the rules/exceptions to allow connections between your PC and device. Unfortunately with most work situations you will have to get the IT Security dept. involved.

Here's the KB article link:

This is for ActiveSync 4.0-4.2 - though it should work with activesync 3.7

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsmobi...c/default.mspx

This is for ActiveSync 3.7 and Windows Firewall

http://www.pocketpcfaq.com/faqs/acti...p2firewall.htm

Hope that helps

[Box]

You could always try a card reader or the program Card Export.