The battery trick worked for me...nice sluthing.  I hope I don't have to do it very often.

The "soft reset" works quite well. You can also "Restart" your phone by pressing the power button until a menu appears. Select "Restart" and click DONE. No need to remove your battery. There are also indications that some users will experience this issue when they recharge the battery using the wall adapter. If so, recharge using the USB cable attached to your PC.

Renaming "iTunes Music Library.xml" worked for me. Thank you very, very much.  I'd like to comment that I found this after spending 5-6 hours and multiple phone calls with HTC support (four or five different reps) who didn't know about this (closest they came was asking me to deinstall iTunes before installing HTC Sync), and trying various suggested "solutions" that might as well have been voodoo.

When I asked them about it -- after reading your post, renaming "iTunes Music Library.xml", getting HTC Sync finally to work, and then discovering to my dismay that sync fails once iTunes is reactivated, they tried to pretend that this was a "feature" -- only if the Three Stooges are running HTC development. This is my third HTC phone, I've been very happy  with them, and there are lots of really cool features to this phone, but I can't believe they let this ridiculous version of HTC Sync out the door."Quietly brilliant" indeed.

After carefully reading all the posts and solutions that worked for some, none did the trick in itself for me, but I finally got it to work by following those steps (HTC Inspire, Win 7 x64). 

1) Disconnect your HTC Inspire from your PC.

2) In Windows 7's Control Panel's Programs and Features: uninstall all HTC software (HTC Sync, HTC BMP USB Driver and HTC Driver Installer). Then download and re-install HTC Sync (setup_3.0.5511.exe). Reboot after completing the installation.

3) Windows 7's firewall must be instructed to allow HTC Sync.exe to go through via: Control Panel >  Windows Firewall > Allow a program or feature through Windows Firewall > Allows another program > HTC Sync > Add > select Home/Work (Private) > OK. If you use a different firewall, you will likely have to do something similar.

4) Because I use iTunes, I had to rename the file iTunes Music Library.xml to some other name (you can also move or delete it). This file resides under C:\Users\{login-name}\Music\iTunes.

5) Start HTC Sync on your PC. It may take a few seconds to show up. At some point, it ended up showing "Updating htc library", but after 20 minutes, I decided it was dead in the water, so went back to step 2. I don't remember if my HTC was connected to my PC or not when that happened, but make sure your HTC is not connected to your PC in any case (i.e. step 1).

6) Once HTC Sync shows up on your screen, connect the Inspire to your PC. A screen shows up on the Inspire, and you need to select "HTC Sync" and touch Done. After a minute or so, HTC Sync showed that it was connected.

A few notes:

- This is a summary of a process that took me 3 hours, with a lot of reboots in between, from which I concluded that you need to have a clean install of HTC Sync, your firewall set up not to block HTC Sync and if you use iTunes, rename/move/delete iTunes Music Library.xml.

- You can simply start this whole process by entirely disabling your firewall, and once you get the sync going, configure it as I mentioned above. That how I proceeded.

- I powered on and off my Inspire a few times in the process, including removing the battery (although I don't think that changes anything).

- The iTunes file iTunes Music Library.xml might be re-created automatically by iTunes, so if the connection stops out of the blue, double-check the presence of that file and if so, rename/move/delete it. I personally created a folder shortcut on my desktop, next to the HTC Sync icon for quick access to that directory, which I will no doubt visit regularly as I do use iTunes.

- During the various reboots, re-install, soft-reset, etc, at some point the HTC showed that it was connected to the PC, only to disconnect seconds after (while HTC Sync never showed a connection). I suspect it was the presence of iTunes Music Library.xml that somehow confuses HTC Sync.

My 2 cents: I applaud HTC to come up with a Android/Outlook sync solution (that's why I chose HTC over Motorola), but HTC must commit the same professionalism and energy toward HTC Sync than it does for its phones. In terms of syncing, HTC Sync appears to work for the moment, but its incompatibility with iTunes cannot be excused. HTC sync should  exactly work as iTunes or Windows Mobile Device Center (aka ActiveSync on XP) i.e. installs in a breeze, fires up upon a device detection and syncs without a second thought, within seconds.

If you come across other issues and/or solutions, make sure to post them. Thanks!

I've gone through the entire thread and nothing has worked.  Windows 7 Professional x 32.  I've powered off and rebooted on both sides of the cable.  I've renamed iTunes xml file.  I've allowed HTSync through the firewall and disabled the firewall completely.

I have a couple of days to figure this out and then I'll have to go back to iPhone, which I dumped to try Android.  Not being able to sync my contacts and calendar are a deal breaker.

It was the cable plus the annoying iTunes thing.  I bought two extra cables, one for the office and one for the car, with the device.  Only the cable that came in the box worked.

HTC, please fix that REALLY ANNOYING iTunes thing.  I use iTunes all the time.  I'm sure a lot of other users do as well.

I found that only the cable in the box worked. I've identified a new weird behavior: Once I got the phone to connect (by deleting iTunes.xml), I found that the phone connected (or not) seemingly at random. I believe I've found this technique:

1) Start HTC Sync before connecting the phone;

2) Connect the phone and let it start syncing, even thought the computer will say it's not syncing.

3) Cancel the sync

4) The phone will then appear on the computer.

It's nuts -- especially frustrating that the HTC help people are trained to grimy lie about the problems.

In the meantime, the music that gets synced seems to be random -- I tried to sync playlists, it synced some playlists that were uncheck, and did not sync others that were. Very peculiar. I have more music in iTunes than will fit on the phone. Also found that the phone cannot play Apple Lossless format files (the iPod resamples automatically).

Did you try to restart the PC? That's what finally worked for me.

The suggestion for Double Twist was great!  Thanks.  Very stable and customizable.

Having the same problem! So far i have gone through 2 of these freakin phones and nothing but problems..it synced before and now it cant find the sync?????? WTH?

I am having the same issue.  I’ve downloaded HTC Sync (and the update) several times ,installed and uninstalled several times, changed all the settings as suggested and it is still not working.  What is HTC Sense?  I’ve searched and can not find that program to download, only HTC Sync.  HTC Sync won’t even open on my computer (Windows 7).  I’ve about had it with this phone.  Every week it seem I have another issue that no one can help with.

I am also having synching problems.  The emails work (from OUTLOOK) but the calendar and contacts do not.  I have installed the tethered version but have the same problem where the HTC Synch does not recognize my phone.  Windows 7 as well

Were you ever able to resolve the synching b/t the phone and your contacts and calendar?

Did you replace the phone?  If so, with what?

attyMJS@gMail.com

-mjs