How The Problem Started

I’ve been a Google Calendar Sync user [...]]]> NOTE: This post is outdated, and probably won’t work well for you. You can actually install the older version of Calendar Sync and it should fix the problem, if not then try this. There’s a link to the new article at the end of this post.

How The Problem Started

I’ve been a Google Calendar Sync user for about a month now, ever since i signed up for NuevaSync. Initially I had set up Exchange push email on my iPhone with my work email and calendar. It’s so nice to have your calendar on your iPhone and get reminders all the time; I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty forgetful. Unfortunately I have two calendars, the other one is my Google Calendar.

I didn’t want to put all of my personal events into my work calendar so I signed up for NuevaSync which allows you to sync Google Calendar among others. Unfortunately you can only use one Exchange account on the iPhone, and that’s exactly what NuevaSync uses. I have my Google Calendar on my phone now, but I didn’t have my work calendar until I downloaded Google’s awesome Calendar Sync application.

Everything was fine and dandy until I upgraded to Outlook 2007 and all hell broke loose. Every time Google Calendar Sync tried to sync, Outlook would crash with the message “Microsoft Office Outlook has encountered a problem and needs to close.
We are sorry fo rthe inconvenience…” It pissed me off, and I’ve been dealing with this error for the past week or so. I tried many solutions including the ones Google offered, none of which worked. Most of them either produced the same error, or one of the following:

“Could not connect to Microsoft Outlook – error [number], code 1010″
“Could not connect to Microsoft Outlook – error [number], code 1011″

Or Outlook would just freeze up entirely, or Google Calendar Sync would look like it was working or keep going forever but not update the calendar at all.

Just for your information, I’m using the one way sync from Outlook to Google.

How to fix the problem

Here’s the steps I took to fix the problem, I would imagine they should work for many other problems as well since it’s not a real specific approach – it makes Outlook and Google Calendar Sync completely start over and reconfigure themselves to work together.

1. Close all open programs, especially Outlook, any Office programs and Google Calendar Sync.
2. Open task manager – in Windows XP you would go to Start, Run, then “taskmgr” and click OK. This doesn’t really apply to any specific OS though, you’ll just have to adapt it to Vista or Windows 7 if that’s what you’re using.
3. End all non-critical processes, if you don’t know if they are critical or not just leave them alone. Just try to close as much as you can.
4. Run “appwiz.cpl” or open add/remove programs in Control Panel. Uninstall Google Calendar Sync. You can also uninstall it through it’s link in the start menu.
5. At this point, it’s uninstalled but not entirely gone. We need to remove all traces of the program. Start by opening the “Program Files” directory, then “Google” and delete the “Google Calendar Sync” folder.
6. Navigate to your user profile directory (or run %USERPROFILE%) and open “Local Settings\Application Data\Google.” Delete the Google Calendar Sync folder in here as well.
7. Now comes the scary part: deleting registry entries. Run regedit. On the left pane, scroll all the way to the top and make sure “My Computer” is selected then hit F3. Type in “Calendar Sync” and hit find.
8. You’ll want to delete any folders (keys) on the left that are labeled “Google Calendar Sync” if the folder isn’t a Google Calendar Sync folder DO NOT delete it, just delete the file (data) on the right that contains the Google Calendar Sync data.
9. Hit F3 again and continue to delete all relevant keys/data pertaining to Google Calendar Sync.
10. Do it again, just to make sure you didn’t miss anything.
11. Fire up a command prompt “run > cmd” with administrative privileges if you’re using Windows Vista / 7 and paste this command in:
    del /F /Q “%SYSTEMROOT%\Prefetch\Goog*”
    and hit enter.  This will delete all the Google prefetch files. These files just make programs load quicker, but they also contain data that we want to flush.
12. Run %SYSTEMROOT%\System32 and find the file Mapi32.dll. Move it to your desktop.
13. Go to run and type “fixmapi” and click OK.
14. Fire up Internet Explorer and go to http://update.microsoft.com (yeah, windows update doesn’t work in other browsers so you have to use IE). Update Windows and Office to the latest. You may have to restart and repeat the process until there are no more updates available.
15. Open Outlook and make sure it still works after all the updates. Also go to Tools > Trust Center > Add Ins and select COM Add-ins on the drop down on the bottom.  Click the “Go…” button and if there is a listing for Google Calendar Sync still in there, select it and click remove.
16. Also in Outlook, go to Tools > Account Settings and open up your account. If you’re using an Exchange server, which you probably are, make sure “Use Cached Exchange Mode” is unchecked. The only thing this will affect is being able to access your email if the server goes offline.
17. You might want to restart at this point.
18. Re download Google Calendar Sync (to make sure you have the latest version) and re-install it with your desired settings.
19. Enjoy watching Google Calendar Sync and Outlook 2007 have a working relationship.

This should fix the problem. Once again, it works for Vista and Windows 7 as well but these steps might require a little adaption so use your head.  If it didn’t work, or you’re getting other errors there are a few additional things you can check:

• Make sure you’re at least a power user, and ideally an administrator on the computer You’re using.
• If you’re using Vista or Win7 make sure Calendar Sync is running as an administrator.
• You can also try different compatibility modes like XP SP2 or 3.
• Make sure your settings are right in Google Calendar
• Make sure the Addin is enabled in Outlook (Tools > Trust center in 2007).
• Make sure Google Calendar is unblocked in the Windows Firewall.
• Try closing all applications and running an update in Calendar Sync – if it works you know some program is interfering with it, it’s just a matter of finding out which one.

EDIT: There’s a newer, faster, and much easier way to fix the problem. In fact, this way doesn’t even work – it’s just going to break again. Please see the newest post on this topic: Google Calendar Sync crashes Outlook