Exchange server sync limitations - Are there any?

[Catrinisin]

Hi all, true Droid newbie here,

Does anyone know what limitations the Droid 2 has with Exchange synchronization? I have read rumors about things like, Tasks not syncing from Exchange, calendar appointments not being able to be marked as accepted/rejected, etc.

Are these claims true? What other, if any, limitations exist?

Any info would be greatly appreciated.

We are using Exchange 2003 currently, and will be upgrading to 2007 or 2010 in the near future if this matters.

 

[keiichi25]

While I am not a Droid X user (Currently still a Moto Droid 1 user), the noticeable limitations with Exchange tends to be sync lag.

I don't have any 'tasks' that get synced up, as I don't believe Droid's standard apps have 'Tasks' or even 'Notes' that is normally part of the Exchange part that Blackberry users have had. Response time for mail, I have noticed sometimes lags a little, although recently, myself being on an Exchange 2008 server, I have noticed that recently, I am getting mail on my phone before my Outlook 2003 program on the computer.

One of the things I have noted, though cannot explain, is changing some of my habits with the phone, such as originally, I treated it like the Blackberry where I wanted it not to receive anything at certain times, and that may have been a contributing factor in how it was having problems with receiving mail with regards to connectivity (Normally, the Blackberry Push server keeps trying to push... From my observations severing connectivity for long periods of time might put some sort of token sequence out of whack with servers and unless you force a sync, it may not sync right.)

I have heard several people complaining about the default client on the Droid X deleting e-mail on their accounts. Again, I am a Droid 1 user and haven't seen that problem, but I am not going to discount it simply because I have not seeing it.

The only other option is to use the Touchdown. I know that the K9 E-mail client hasn't exactly been working as nicely of recent with my droid for Exchange and don't know if it syncs other things as well.

 

[Catrinisin]

Thanks for the reply. I am headed to VZW to pick up my new phone today so I suppose I will try out the Droid 2 and test the hell out of it for the 3 day grace period.

Thanks for the tip on Touchdown, that looks like it supports all of the calender stuff I need too, although I can't confirm if K9 doesn't.

 

[keiichi25]

If I recall correctly, K9 is more mail oriented client, hence my not sure it will sync the other parts. As I prefer the default mail client on mine and I know it does exchange sync for Contacts and calendar, I had no problems not having tasks or notes not syncing with it, especially since I never used either.

I don't use Touchdown mostly cause at the time, this is my personal phone and I am not really 'married' to spending money on an exchange client where the default part of the phone seems to be working fine for the moment. Now if it was my own personal Exchange server and I was having mail issues, I might lean towards Touchdown myself.

 

[takeshi]

Does anyone know what limitations the Droid 2 has with Exchange synchronization?

I don't know off the top of my head but highly recommend looking into this as well as the alternative Exchange clients and what they can do for you. I'm using Touchdown because of limitations in the stock Exchange client on the Droid. No issues with email being pushed in a timely fashion here.

 

[Catrinisin]

I don't know off the top of my head but highly recommend looking into this as well as the alternative Exchange clients and what they can do for you. I'm using Touchdown because of limitations in the stock Exchange client on the Droid. No issues with email being pushed in a timely fashion here.

Was this the reason you switched to Touchdown? Email pushing not working sometimes?

So far on my new phone I got yesterday, the push was working well, except for one period where I noticed no emails have come in, so I click the email, and then there are 6 or 7 coming in right then over the past two hours. So not only did push not work for this period, but the fetch which is set for 15 min also did not kick in as it says it will if push isn't working.

Worried.

 

[keiichi25]

I don't know off the top of my head but highly recommend looking into this as well as the alternative Exchange clients and what they can do for you. I'm using Touchdown because of limitations in the stock Exchange client on the Droid. No issues with email being pushed in a timely fashion here.

Was this the reason you switched to Touchdown? Email pushing not working sometimes?

So far on my new phone I got yesterday, the push was working well, except for one period where I noticed no emails have come in, so I click the email, and then there are 6 or 7 coming in right then over the past two hours. So not only did push not work for this period, but the fetch which is set for 15 min also did not kick in as it says it will if push isn't working.

Worried.

I believe that this was the complaint from some people about the Droid's default Mail Client sometimes not syncing in a timely manner. BTW, I don't think you should have it on a timed check, leave it on push and see if it works, but in the end, I hear for some they preferred touchdown overall.