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Is there an (easy) way to remove all contacts?

RetiredInFl

RetiredInFl

macrumors 68020
Original poster
(3GS) I now have duplicate contacts - HUNDREDS of them ..... I guess between iTunes SYNC w/Outlook & MobileME sync with Outlook they have duplicated. Deleting 1 by 1 is out of the question as is "restarting" the entire phone due to jailbreaking. I just want to delete ALL the contacts.
 
Hmmmm, I don't think that matters but how about this?

- In iTunes with your iPhone connected, select your iPhone on the left.
- In your iPhone menu select "Info".
- Scroll to the "Advanced" menu at the bottom.
- Check the box for "Contacts" under "Replace information on this iPhone"
- Then Sync.

It'll erase all of your contacts and then re-sync only that you have saved through iTunes.
 
LOL ... well I tried the Settings<General<Reset<Erase All Contents and Settings and now the phone is in an endless loop of the Apple with the little circle that looks like the sun superimposed on the bottom of the Apple.

What do I do now? Guess I have to start from scratch. Well, at least my contacts will be gone! 😱

iphone.aggie said:
No, it doesn't do anything to apps or their settings.
Click to expand...
 
MisterEdF said:
LOL ... well I tried the Settings<General<Reset<Erase All Contents and Settings and now the phone is in an endless loop of the Apple with the little circle that looks like the sun superimposed on the bottom of the Apple.

What do I do now? Guess I have to start from scratch. Well, at least my contacts will be gone! 😱
Click to expand...

Damn it, xbuddycorex. 🙂

I sincerely apolologize, you were supposed to do a reset all settings (not an erase). I didn't catch that he told you to do that.

All is not lost, you can do a DFU restore and then sync.
 
iphone.aggie said:
Damn it, xbuddycorex. 🙂

I sincerely apolologize, you were supposed to do a reset all settings (not an erase). I didn't catch that he told you to do that.

All is not lost, you can do a DFU restore and then sync.
Click to expand...

Remember to set up phone as new. Otherwise all conflicting settings will go back and you will have to redo it.
 
Doing that now ... I seems that will install 3.01 and kill my jailbreak. Waaaaaah! Is there even a JB for 3.01?

iphone.aggie said:
Damn it, xbuddycorex. 🙂

I sincerely apolologize, you were supposed to do a reset all settings (not an erase). I didn't catch that he told you to do that.

All is not lost, you can do a DFU restore and then sync.
Click to expand...
 
MisterEdF said:
Doing that now ... I seems that will install 3.01 and kill my jailbreak. Waaaaaah! Is there even a JB for 3.01?
Click to expand...

Yup! http://blog.iphone-dev.org/

And I stand by my former suggestions, if you just "reset settings" all it does it reset all of the iPhones settings, it doesn't affect your content at all so it wouldn't do anything about his contacts problem, only by erasing them will it help him out.
 
^^^^^^^^^^^
EDIT: You really meant for him to do that???



jav6454 said:
They pretty much said what I was going to suggest.😀
Click to expand...

Notice that xbuddycorex has left the building. 🙂

I was watching a movie and posting. I'm really sorry to the OP. I know the difference between the two and I'm always stating make sure you don't ERASE when I tell people to reset all settings. I just didn't see that he told you that, since it was obvious he was trying to reset your settings.

I know my excuse is no excuse, but I am sorry.
 
iphone.aggie said:
Notice that xbuddycorex has left the building. 🙂

I was watching a movie and posting. I'm really sorry to the OP. I know the difference between the two and I'm always stating make sure you don't ERASE when I tell people to reset all settings. I just didn't see that he told you that, since it was obvious he was trying to reset your settings.

I know my excuse is no excuse, but I am sorry.
Click to expand...

You spoke too soon. 😀
 
iphone.aggie said:
^^^^^^^^^^^
EDIT: You really meant for him to do that???
Click to expand...

Yah! What would "Reset Settings" do for his problem? He has duplicate contacts because he has synced his contacts using multiple methods. If he wasn't jailbroken my original suggestion would have worked just fine, but since he is jailbroken I provided my second suggestion.

He chose the first.

Either way his problem will be solved and everything will be back to normal, it'll just take a little more time since he's jb.
 
xbuddycorex said:
Yah! What would "Reset Settings" do for his problem? He has duplicate contacts because he has synced his contacts using multiple methods. If he wasn't jailbroken my original suggestion would have worked just fine, but since he is jailbroken I provided my second suggestion.

He chose the first.

Either way his problem will be solved and everything will be back to normal, it'll just take a little more time since he's jb.
Click to expand...

Got it.

jav6454 said:
It happens when you skim through posts....🙄😀
Click to expand...

I'm not skimming. He just came back while I was typing. 😱
 
Whew ... ended up with 3.01, redid everything from scratch, JB'd and back to "normal" including just 1 copy of contacts.

To prevent this problem I assume I should NOT have BOTH MobileMe AND iTunes syncing my contacts (although I would have thought the iPhone was smart enough to resolve the dupes). 🙂
 
MisterEdF said:
Whew ... ended up with 3.01, redid everything from scratch, JB'd and back to "normal" including just 1 copy of contacts.

To prevent this problem I assume I should NOT have BOTH MobileMe AND iTunes syncing my contacts (although I would have thought the iPhone was smart enough to resolve the dupes). 🙂
Click to expand...

Glad you got things working, but I don't think you needed to do any of the things you did. My guess is that what you did was choose not to merge contacts when you set up your MobileMe account. This didn't cause duplicate contacts, it just kept your MobileMe contacts and your Outlook contacts in separate folders on your address book. When you viewed "all contacts" you were seeing both address books. The simpler solution would have been to delete and re-add your MobileMe account in Email settings and choose to merge contacts with MobileMe when asked. You can safely do that if you wish, and it will automatically back up changes you make either in Outlook or on your iPhone.
 
Kasey said:
clear.gif
Click to expand...

fail
 
😛😛😛😛 🙂 Duhhhh ..... on the procedure .... but I did have to reinitialize because the phone went into an endless reboot loop.

thelatinist said:
Glad you got things working, but I don't think you needed to do any of the things you did. My guess is that what you did was choose not to merge contacts when you set up your MobileMe account. This didn't cause duplicate contacts, it just kept your MobileMe contacts and your Outlook contacts in separate folders on your address book. When you viewed "all contacts" you were seeing both address books. The simpler solution would have been to delete and re-add your MobileMe account in Email settings and choose to merge contacts with MobileMe when asked. You can safely do that if you wish, and it will automatically back up changes you make either in Outlook or on your iPhone.
Click to expand...
 
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