My trusty old HTC Touch 3G (Windows Mobile 6.1) had developed a strange fault:

I would plug in in to my PCs USB port, and it would always try to connect using internet sharing (which I didn’t want it to do, as my PC already had an internet connection), and I couldn’t get it to connect via Activesync or as a USB drive.

No amount of changing default connection type or setting / unsetting the “ask me at connection time” would change this behavior.

Since Since most of my data is now in the Google cloud, it wasn’t a major problem, however, I often needed to transfer data to and from my phone.

I then stumbled onto the solution:

• Plugin the phone via USB
• wait until it connects (internet sharing)
• unplug the phone
• within a few seconds, plugin the phone again!

Its very strange behavior, but it did let me transfer data.

The Activesync connection was still a problem, and I really wasn’t interested in wasting time trying to find a solution to a Microsoft-induced problem.

For the record: My HTC Touch 3G has since died, and I’m now the proud owner of an Android-powered HTC Desire… Personally, I find that there is little difference between the iphone and Android… but they are both way ahead of Windows Mobile 6.1.

I’ve had little chance to try the latest windows mobile 7, but I hope to try it out soon.