need help URGENT - backup "Contacts" prior to re-flash (6260 & 3650)

[Thanh]

Hello :)

Please, to anyone who is highly experienced with Symbians: You may have heard of my BF's (and mine) trouble with a certain 6260. According to Nokia's head office, now finally one of the NCC's here is able to perform service and flashing on 6260's. We yet don't have confirmation since both numbers for that particualar NCC are busy since early hours (i guess all 6260 owners in whole Thailand must be phoning in there), but this time i don't travel halfway thru the most congested city in the world just to hear "sorry, no equipment...." again.

Now i need help here.

Prior to flashing that phone, i would like to backup the contacts to either PC or to MMC on the phone. Now i tried the following on both that 6260 and mine 3650, getting the exact same results:

located file "c:/system/data/contacts.cdb" which has the same size in kilobytes as stated by "Manager" for "Contacts". Must be the one, no? The tried to send that file via IR to the PC. Both phones say "Unable to send copyrighted item". BS. Tried to rename that file to something else in order to send it - both phones "Manager: Already in use". BS too. The tried to bluetooth that file to the respective other phone - again "Unable to send copyrighted item".

Then i fired up eFileManager and digged to that file, "copy" and go to e:, "paste"..... here the 3650 says "Access denied" while the 6260 does nothing at all. Both of them will not copy this dumb file. Also "copy to ZIP" does only create a empty ZIP file and produces the same error on the 3610 (and again, no message and no action either on the 6260).

I checked the file properties, it was "system" but not even "hidden", i changed those to any possible combination and still i am unable to make a backup of that file.

So please, does anybody know how to save this vital file from being erased in the flashing process? It is a pain in the ass to retype 200+ phone numbers, because the SIM does not hold additional infos.... and almost all contacts have thigs such as last name, e-mail etc.

I would appreciate greatly ANY help :)

Kind regards.....

your Thanh

[Pou_pee]

you can rename "data" folder to whatever you like and then you can copy and paste contacts.cdb (you can do it with FExplorer) :)

btw, don't forget to rename it back, or else you'll need to flash the phone

[Thanh]

Hi there :)

Thank you so much for that! Yes, it indeed worked. On both phones! Now once i got a hold of the NCC (still both landline numbers engaged all the time) i will give it to them (provided they really DO have the flashing equipment) and hopefully can get it finally to a more usable state.

And... happy new year to you and all the others :)

Kind regards.....

your Thanh

[maxice5000]

doesnt "back-up Device mem" do that?

[neruanza]

you can rename "data" folder to whatever you like and then you can copy and paste contacts.cdb (you can do it with FExplorer) :)

btw, don't forget to rename it back, or else you'll need to flash the phone


Hey don't know y, but i can't rename the Data folder of my 6600 (v 5.27.0 28-06-2004) :???:
However, there is an app called smartvcard that copies all your cantacts in a unique file that you'll be able to send to another fon..

Someone have tried to sync its phonebook with outlook :???:

[Thanh]

Hi there :)

On the 6260 in question there is an option "Mighty Backup", yes indeed. I had no idea what to do with it..... a Nokia staff once said that "this can not be used in Thailand". Well, i did it via the above mentioned method, which worked to some extend - being screwed by Nokia AGAIN (yes, they DID flash it yesterday - with the SAME SOFTWARE VERSION because "the new one could not turn on after upgrade"....) and then i copied the contacts.cdb file back to the data folder - well, it went "Data base is corrupted", but after *#7370# it worked.... funny phone, that 6260.

And right now, i am testing that "Mighty Backup" thing and it indeed seems to work - it's sending data somewehere. Anyone knows where it is actually sent to?

Ok forget that last one. It's finished by now, and already registered blah on the "www.mightybackup.com" website. Seems to work perfectly. Yet - on the phone it says "Purchase now"... what for? It does already work? Or is this only a trial version?

Any info on that?

Kind regards.....

Thanh

[kooops]

is full version which hv one year subscription,
for more details, u should go to http://www.mightybackup.com
u can edit, delete ur contacts online, after u hv log in.

i recommed u set ur MightyBackup's "Set schedule" to Unscheduled,
if u r not subscribe for unlimited GPRS connection.

[2more]

and what about PC synchronization?
it works for me
its quick and easy

[vzx]

Well since your problem is solved there seems to be no problem.. but keep these follwoing points in mind in the future

1). backup your contacts via PC suite- that is why the sofware is provided with your phone

2). if you dont have PC suite then try renaming your contacts.db file to some ohter name - this method works on some models and not in others - ah well always worth a try

3) finally a sure shot solution is SmartVcard.. install it on your phone and take backup of all your contact on you memory card in .vcf format.... then format/falsh your phone.. install SmartVcard again and import all your contacts from that saved file

Life cant be more simple

Cheers
Vzx

[Thanh]

Hello :)

In the meantime i did several such "backup" procedures, using different phones. Once on the 3650 (got flashed to higher firmware version), on the 6260 and also to copy the entire contacts from the 3650 to my "new" 6600. I did the "rename data folder" method, which turned out to be GREAT.

The plus is obviously, it doesn't require an extra app. And once "data" is renamed, i can easily copy that file to anywhere, even to the PC using bluetooth and Desktop File Manager.

About PC Suite: I got the version for the 6600 working on my computer, altough with errors (on startup: "This action can not be completed because the other program is busy" blah error) and it likes to hang sometimes. AND it slowed the whole freakin' computer down! Not just a little, but considerably. But i can live with that. I don't use the actual PC Suite because of it's crashy behaviour, instead i need it installed for the M-Router bit which is needed for Desktop File Manager.

(Does anyone know of a M-Router standalone program???)

The 6260-version of PC Suite (which would support the 6600 as well) does install on my PC, BUT... won't run. It actually opens, firing an error ("unable to create empty document") and then presents me with some options. Clicking each of them results in some runtime error, followed by program termination. In short, it's completely useless. That is Windows XP/SP2 and according to some techie at MBK, PC Suite's latest versions don't work well with that SP2, but OLDER versions DO work! Funny eh? I won't install Windows98 just to get a lousy PC Suite to work.

Kind regards.....

your Thanh

[vzx]

Well usually the PC suite versions of a new phone should support the previous phones as well but there might be an exception in this case.. i dunno for sure.. i own an N-gage and it works only with the PC suite provided with my phone.. not with an y other PC-suites.. strange..

Anyway most probably i think that the problem is with windows XP SP2.. i comes with it's default bluetooth drivers and if we try to install some other (WDICOMM) drivers drivers, it ususally causes a driver clash.. (atleast it happened to me)..

Previously when i had winXP SP1, i did not have such kind of problem.. so anyway i installed Windows Millenium along with XP SP2.. and my drivers work well in Win Me..