Operating System
May 24, 2008
Tip and Trick Editorial
41 Comments

Windows Mobile Device Cannot Connect (or Quickly Disconnect or Drop) and Not Sync with Vista WMDC (ActiveSync)

Whenever user connect a Windows Mobile device to Windows Vista Windows Mobile Device Center (WMDC) via a USB cable, WMDC fails to connect to the Pocket PC (PPC) Phone device, causing synchronization not start or fail. Sometimes, WMDC may tries to connect to mobile device with “Connecting” message for a while, but eventually fails with “Disconnected” message. In some worse case, Windows Vista doesn’t detect any Windows Mobile device been connected, and no response or connect attempt action in WMDC.

In Device Manager, Windows Mobile-based device driver under Portable Devices and Microsoft Mobile Device Remote Adapter local area network connection under Network Adapters appear briefly before missing or disappearing again. Any connection established is terminated, dropped, disconnected, vanished and disappeared within a few seconds. When the connection is not established, user cannot or unable to sync the PC with desktop, and can’t install applications or transfer files. Soft reset or hard reset the device also does not help to perfectly fix the problem.

Microsoft publishes several troubleshooting tips to fix device unable to connec issue. One of the cause appears to be Windows Live OneCare that blocks the device connectivity. To allow the device to connect via Windows Live OneCare, enable (check) the ActiveSync/Windows Mobile Device Center – synchronize my mobile devices with my computer rule in Firewall Connection Tool button (Firewall tab) of Windows Live OneCare settings. Also in Firewall Tab, click on Advanced button and go to Ports and Protocols tab. Add and create a port called Windows Mobile Device Center with TCP Port Range as 5721, For Connections dropdown as Inbound [local ports] and Scope is set to Local network (subnet).

Other possible cause in failure to connect to WMDC is due to driver installation may not have completed successfully. If you think this may be the case, follow these steps:

  1. Keep the WM device connected.
  2. Go to Start > Start Search.
  3. Enter Device Manager or devmgmt.msc to launch the Device Manager window.
  4. Look under the Network adapters node for Microsoft Windows Mobile Remote Adapter. If this is not present, skip to step 5. Otherwise, right-click Microsoft Windows Mobile Remote Adapter and choose to Uninstall.
  5. Look under the Mobile Devices node for Microsoft USB Sync. If this is not present, skip to step 6. Otherwise, right-click Microsoft USB Sync and choose to Uninstall.
  6. Disconnect and reconnect the WM device. The device driver for the PPC Phone will re-install and Windows Mobile Device Center will launch.

If Microsoft resolution doesn’t help, try to disable the Advanced Network Functionality mode on the Windows Mobile device from the USB to PC icon in Connections of Start Menu Settings. After turning off Advanced Network Functionality, the device will be connected via a USB Serial driver, the sync will be done via native Smartphone USB Sync device driver and no LAN network connection is made.

However, the most likely and most possible resolution for dropped connection and not connected problem for Windows Mobile Device Center is related to Windows Media Player process. On connection with a Windows Mobile device, system will launch wmplayer.exe process, even though Windows Media Player is not ran or opened, and user is not syncing any music, song or media files at internal memory storage or SD memory card.

The wmplayer.exe process for unknown reason will terminate the connection, according to experience of a few users. As wmplayer.exe process won’t terminate itself, user have to end and kill the process as fast as possible once the Pocket PC device is connected to computer and wmplayer.exe process service is launched.

To manually terminate the wmplayer.exe, right click on Windows Taskbar and click on Task Manager. Then click on Image Name to sort the list of processes according to name alphabetically. Locate and highlight wmplayer.exe near the bottom of the list, and click on End Process button. After a while, the device will install with correct driver, connect and WMDC will sync. If the device still doesn’t connect and sync, try to disconnect and reconnect the device again, and kill off any wmplayer.exe service that run after connecting as soon as possible.

If system is not responding to or takes no action to detect, install connect any plugged in Windows Mobile device (and of course WMDC no sync action too), it may be causing by existing wmplayer.exe already existed, blocking future sync process. To fix the issue, open Task Manager (taskmgr in Start Search), and search for any wmplayer.exe service that is running, and kill or end all these processes. Re-connect the Windows Mobile device, and Windows Mobile Device Center should connect and sync properly.


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  • hfrmobile

    Wondering that Microsoft still has not fixed that issue in 2012 and I guess they never fix that stuff since the concentrate only on Windows Phone 7 ;-)

  • Serge

    Thanks! The uninstall network driver trick help me (win7x64, ASUS P750)

  • Geo

    Thanks! The uninstall network driver trick worked for me (win7x64,HTC Titan)

  • Eddie

    Thanks. That solution worked for my Win 7 sync center setup :-)

  • Nicklas

    Good article, but in the end for me it didn;t help. My problem was that I for some reason hadn't updated to the latest WMDC last week when I got Windows7 installed. After seeing there was a WMDC 6.1 version instead of my 6.0.. I updated this and then it finally started syncying!! Thanks for pushing me to try one last thing!

  • Ben

    You're the man, you're the man!

    The first 1! who actually helped me with this

    I almost gave up

    Thanks a lot !!!

  • http://www.tipandtrick.net Elena

    Thanks a lot!!!

    I removed wmplayer.exe and now everything works!

    Thank you! I would never find it by myself…

  • SUMIT JAIN

    Same problem with me, but the article have solved my issues and suddenly my pc started doing sync after few months..

    great article and thanks a lot.
    sumit

  • about2flip

    Worked like a charm, thanks much!!

  • l1m0n3s

    who's the man? GARY (reply #29) is the MAN!!!!

    thanks….. many days looking for the awsner to this problem. many thanks!!!!

  • Merlin

    Gary! (reply #29) – - you're a savior!

    Searched for DAYS – had reinstalled WinMobile twice – deleting the registry WinCE was the key.

    What I did: See reply #29; Also renamed Winblows Media Player executable so it will NEVER start again (doesn't matter – it broke never to run again after I tried installing that abortion Vista SP2 – of course I had to reassign permissions to myself away from "trusted Installer" to do that). The drivers reloaded and Sync started – but quit half-way through – SO – I disabled the 'Advanced Network Functionality" on the HTC (Tilt) – Winblows loaded the HTC driver – and it has all worked ever since.

  • http://www.jeedo.net/ Jeedo

    I had the same problem earlier. Just in case this helps somebody please see what I did to get my daxian x999+ communicating with Windows 7 WMDC: http://www.jeedo.net/howto/windows-mobile-connect…

  • gary

    After reading a post by David Adelman in another thread, I followed his advice, which was to take these steps:

    – disconnect the WM device

    – on the PC, use regedit to remove the entire folder HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindows CE Services (right click on the entry in the tree in the left pane of the regedit window, the select "Delete")

    – uninstall WMDC and its upgrade

    – reinstall WMDC and its upgrade (easily done by downloading and running, as an Administrator, the current file from MS from one of the URLs shown below; this installs the new drivers first, then WMDC); this rebuilds the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESOFTWAREMicrosoftWindows CE Services folder, but now with correct values (specifically, ConnectTypesAllowed is now 10, rather than 8 as I saw before removing the old folder)

    – reconnect the WM device

    – watch in delight and relief as WMDC connects and partners with the WM device

    No reboots of the PC or hard (or even soft) resets of the WM device are needed.

    My Tilt is now happily sucking up all the info it had been missing, and I can get back to work.

    URLs for latest WMDC 6.1 (with all updates and drivers; worth having even if you're not having problems):

    Vista 32-bit: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?F…

    Vista 64-bit: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?f…

  • Jim

    The Advanced Network Functionality worked for my Samsung Omnia and Windows 7.

    Thanks!!

  • Mark Schneider

    Found a solution…

    (I'm running WM 6.1 Pro on an HTC/AT&T Fuze.)

    Ending the wmplayer.exe task quickly didn't work for me. But this did:

    On the device, go to Start > Settings > Connections > USB to PC. Next, uncheck the "Enable faster data synchronization" box. Click "Ok".

    As soon as I clicked "Ok", my computer recognized the device. (No reboots/restarts required.)

  • Racjkefratz

    Had failure to sync after a hard reset on my Omnia (to get rid of uninstalled remnants of WMWifiRouter). "Disable advanced network functionality" got the ball rolling and it synced – thankyou for the tip. Following sync, I right-clicked on the device in Device Manager and selected "Update Driver" and let it look "everywhere" (meaning, the internet). It found one and installed it. Now, I'm able to use "advanced network functionality" again – a good thing. Thanks again.

  • sandor

    Thank you for all!!!It's work fine!

  • Mark Harrigan

    I wish I could say this worked for me – as indeed it is true about the media player porcesses and services. But no success :(

    I have tried ALL these tips – running Vista 64bit and WMDC – I have to agree with Annoyed. Vista x64 is the WORST os ever designed – DONT use it if you can avoid it

  • Demi

    Hi,

    Thanks a million for the tip. It worked ! I am really grateful.

  • JVPOT

    THIS IS AWESOME!

    IT WORKS FINE WITH MY HTC P4350

    THANK YOU SO MUCH

  • NIKER

    I had this problem on my HTC Touch Pro all of the sudden my ActiveSync on Vista stopped working. When I connected the cable, WMDC started to sync and dropped the connection after 3seconds. Nothing helped, drivers, WMDC reinstall, USB modes, reflash, no luck on PC or PPC side. The problem was WM11 new syncing "feature", there was no process visible though, it just killed the sync. Solution I found is quite simple: Go to your storage card and delete folder WMDRM, then create (or duplicate something) a new file and rename it to WMDRM (without extension). Done :)

    WMP will look for the library folder and will see that WMDRM actually exists, it won't check whether its a folder or file though. When it discovers that the "folder" can't be opened, it will give up the sync. Easy huh? :)

  • http://ittechtalk.net redson

    Disabling advanced network functionality on Moto 9QM worked for me.. Thanks for writing this troubleshooting post.

  • cj

    I have Vista with Windows Mobile Device Center trying to connect to Windows Mobile 6 device (Samsung Blackjack). I also don't have USB to PC listed under connection options on the device, am I missing something?

  • FH

    I was all over the place trying to enable firewall ports and Upnp service and you name it…Disabling Advanced Network Functionality worked to connect my iPAQ E-210 to Vista. Thanks a bunch!

  • Jonathan

    Thanks a ton! Disabling Advanced Network Functionality allowed my phone to finally connect using Windows 7. Thanks again!

  • Jeff D.

    I am still having problems. I was hoping that the one uncheck trick would help, but no go. :(

  • Bec

    Thankyou so much for this. Turned out all I had to do was diable the advanced network functionality :)

  • Me

    If you have Intellisync:

    1: Go to the 'control panel' of Intellisync

    2: Settings

    3: ActiveSync

    4: Set ActiveSync Connection to: Enabled

    (Remember to set the ActiveSync in Windows to NOT sync things!!)

  • rsadler

    Ok..I found out that I dont have the usb icon because my Windows Mobile 5.0 is an earlier build. To upgrade it I need to sync it..but I can't sync, being my reason for being here. :(

  • Grandma Geek

    Thank You!!!

    Thank You!!!

    Thank You!!!

    Thank You!!!

    Removed one checkmark and all is right with my phone!

    "…disable the Advanced Network Functionality mode…" worked for my XV6800.

    I have been searching for a solution for the past month. Spent hours on the phone with Verizon with no results.

  • rsadler

    I'm assuming you all are using Windows Mobile 6.0? I don't have the USB to PC icon in that location.

  • haani

    Thank you so much disabling advanced network functionality did the trick!!!

  • Steve

    And one other thing: make sure you take your storage card out!

  • Steve

    Wow, this is fantastic. Killing WMP did the trick for me and the last two additions are also important. Thanks a lot!!!!

  • http://www.bottnet.de karsten

    … and uncheck "sync this device automatically" in "set up syn" in wmplayer !!!!

  • http://www.bottnet.de Karsten

    That points into the right direction: if the Storage card was seen by the Host before, vista tries to start it as a Media Device. Disable Autoplay or set Mobile devices to "Ask for Action" will solve the Problem.

  • Mike Parker

    Holy crap! I've had problems connecting my WM device for nearly two years, and I finally came across this blog. Disabling Advanced Network Functionality fixed the problem! THANK YOU!

  • Matt

    disable the Advanced Network Functionality mode on the Windows Mobile device from the USB to PC icon in Connections of Start Menu Settings.

    this worked for my omnia many thanks

  • sousou`

    thanks (Y)

  • Annoyed

    Nothing works for me, I've given up trying to make it work on Vista x64.

    I'll go back to XP.

    Thanks for nothing MS.

  • R Tucker

    Disabling Advanced Network Functionality worked to connect my Samsung i760 to Vista. Now I'm all synched up and ROCKIN again!