Help! Lost hard drive, how do I sync my iphone now w/o loosing everything?

[ellaj]

So I lost EVERYTHING on my hard drive- should have backed it up but didn't. I lost all my contacts, family pics and itunes.

The only place that some of these things still exist now is on my iphone. When I try to sync my iphone my new hardrive does not recognize it.

I am told I can start from scratch but I don't want to loose all my pictures, contacts etc. on my phone. Everyday that goes by I am more worried I am going to lose whats on my phone b/c I have not backed it up for months now.

Most importantly is there anyway to upload everything on my iphone back to my computer- ie itunes library, ifoto pics, contacts etc?

My husband said he asked at the apple store and they said there was nothing they could do to help- I am confused (and ticked off). Thanks for any advice!

 

[nickels]

Don't sync with itunes at first, just connect your iPhone and do a back-up. Then at least your data is all saved. That will not save your music, so you are hosed there. It will save your contacts, data, IMs, emails, and photos. Then you can transfer apps from the iPhone to the PC.

Then for the music you just need some software to transfer the songs from your iPhone to your PC. Then you can re-add them to iTunes and you'll be able to sync again without worries. I recommend IMToo (software) to do the music transfer.

Check your inbox, I sent you a message as well.

 

[-aggie-]

Don't sync with itunes at first, just connect your iPhone and do a back-up. Then at least your data is all saved. That will not save your music, so you are hosed there. It will save your contacts, data, IMs, emails, and photos. Then you can transfer apps from the iPhone to the PC.

Then for the music you just need some software to transfer the songs from your iPhone to your PC. Then you can re-add them to iTunes and you'll be able to sync again without worries. I recommend IMToo (software) to do the music transfer.

Check your inbox, I sent you a message as well.

A backup does not save contacts or photos (except the photos taken with the camera, i.e., the camera roll). Contacts and photos are synced.

You didn't say whether you had a PC or Mac. For a PC, you can use sharepod, which is free, to get your music and all photos saved to your hard drive. Senuti is a program you can use for the Mac.

In iTunes you set the preferences for which things to sync. When you check contacts and calendar it recognizes it has never synced and asks if you want to erase or merge the contents. Choosing merge will then bring all the data from the iPhone to iCal and AddressBook. I'm not sure how well this works on a PC.

So, use sharepod or Senuti. Then do the backup. Then sync.

 

[ellaj]

thanks

Thanks, I actually have a mac. I will try your advice and get back you. REALLY appreciate it.