To make a long story short: In July I upgraded from my iPhone 3G 16Gb to a 3GS with 32 Gb. It synched with iTunes on my PC with no problem. Then I decided to update the firmware from 3.1 to 4.0. It installed normally. Then iTunes told me I needed to update it to work with iPhone OS 4. I upgraded to the then-current version. The first sign of trouble was an error message. “iTunes did not install correctly. You may not be able to burn CDs.” I brushed this off as I don’t use iTunes to burn CDs. I opened iTunes, then connected my 3GS. OK. It began to charge the battery and Explorer detected it as a camera. So far, so good. I waited. And waited some more. The iPhone was not synching. I connected my old 3G. iTunes was happy. It was detecting it like before. I reconnected the 3GS. ITunes continued in its non-recognition of the device.
The next morning I made an appointment with the Apple store. I asked them to check out my 3GS. They did a fresh install of OS4. They verified that the phone synched up with their machines running Windows iTunes. I took it home. Still no connection. Damn. I uninstalled and reinstalled iTunes multiple times. Same error message. Unable to sync the 3GS, even though the 3G continued to happily sync. I should note I did not update the 3G firmware, only my 3GS. After several cycles of uninstalling and reinstalling iTunes with the same results, I gave up. The 3G synched, so I was able to use it like an iPod Touch. The 3GS, at least I could install apps wirelessly, still use the web and email, and since I had a Rhapsody subscription, I could download music with that.
Today, after several months, I decided to do an update of iTunes. Downloaded it, installed it. No error message like previously. That looked promising. I opened iTunes, connected the 3GS and waited.
“ITunes has detected that an iPhone has previously been synched to this computer. What would you like to do?”
Restore from backup.
YESSS! YESSS, PINKY! HELLS, YESSS!
After several months, my 3GS is now synching with iTunes. I am in the process of restoring the apps and will start in synching as much music as I can. I had begun to seriously question my decision to buy a new phone and had considered buying a new computer to get it to sync. But it is now working normally as intended. Life is good. As mundane and pointless as this is, who would ever have thought such a minor thing as this would make me feel as though I had won the lottery?
