Sync Contacts and Email with Microsoft Exchange Server, Facebook, and Google Accounts

When syncing with Microsoft Exchange Server, it is important to start with your contacts, and then do your email accounts, and then sync your calendar appointments.

Before You Do Anything

The Palm Pre on its first day out had a few bugs that make syncing with Outlook and Microsoft Exchange Server difficult. An update was published immediately on the day of the Palm Pre’s release, so before you do anything, open the updates app in your launcher (that looks like a little orange present), and syncing will be guaranteed to be smooth. It was a rather large update, about 67 mb, and should take around 15 minutes if you’re in a good wifi area.

Sync Your Contacts First

To sync your contacts, open the Launcher (using the button at the bottom right corner, on the right side of the the dock) and open the Contacts app. Syncing contacts is as easy as entering your username and password to your different accounts. You are allowed to sync multiple Microsoft Exchange Server Outlook accounts, as well as Facebook and Google gmail. When you sync to these accounts, email and phone numbers are automatically pulled and added to your phone’s contact database.

Once you have synced your contacts, you are ready to sync your email in the same fashion. I have found that if I try to sync email first, the handshake with Microsoft Exchange server is not complete. You’ll know you’ve completely synced when you see the gold Microsoft Outlook logo next to your emails. If you’re still seeing the blue generic Palm Pre email symbol in the new mail notifications, you probably need to remove the current email accounts, sync your contacts first, and then proceed with the same directions you followed to sync with Microsoft Exchange Server to begin with.

How To Sync with Microsoft Exchange Server and Multiple Accounts

When syncing your email with Microsoft Exchange Server, simply tap the Add an Account button. If you already have an Outlook account made, you can add multiple accounts by tapping the drop-down menu button in the top left of the touchscreen, and selecting “Preferences and Accounts.” You can then proceed to “Add a New Account.”

When adding an Outlook account tied to Microsoft Exchange Server, simply select Exchange (EAS) from the list of account types (as opposed to POP or IMAP servers), and list the incoming server name (for example, mail.example.com), and my login name (which was just everything before the @ symbol in my email address) and that should do it (I didn’t have to list the domain name because it would be redundant at this point).