OneNote does not sync

Anonymous
2016-08-11T10:45:46+00:00

Hi there,

This morning I started to have problems with OneNote 2013. First I got an error saying that one notebook (stored in OneDrive) could not sync: "We're sorry, something went wrong during sync. We'll try again later. (Error code: 0xE4020017)"

The errors were associated to a particular section. Following: https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Fix-issues-when-you-can-t-sync-OneNote-299495ef-66d1-448f-90c1-b785a6968d45, I tried to open that notebook in OneNote online. That worked although I could not open the section. Then I copied all the pages in that section to a newly created section. This did not help either. now two sections could not sync. Then I decided so sort the pages in that section and distributed (moved) the pages among various notebooks and sections. Now several of my notebooks cannot sync..... :-(

Finally I decided to close the notebook but now I cannot re-open it. it looks like all the data is still in OneDrive but i cannot sync the notebook to my local OneNote 2013 (windows 8) and also not to my ipad. 

This is quite frustrating. anyone with a suggestion/solution to my problems?

Thanks,

Raul 

PS: after moving various pages around i ended up with several empty sections. I deleted these sections from various notebooks but these sections keep on re-appearing after a few secs.... :- S

EDIT: I just noticed that there is something wrong with several of my notebook files stored in OneDrive. I wanted to make a back up of my notebooks by copying them to another location in OneDrive but the problematic notebooks cannot be copied... I hope that I did not loose any important file. I would appreciate receiving help from the Microsoft community to fix my issues. Thanks!

Microsoft 365 and Office | OneNote | For home | Windows

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  1. Anonymous
    2016-08-11T21:26:15+00:00

    I'm pretty sure that its still broken. I doing a bit more testing now and I'm still getting issues. The best option right now is probably to close it all down and save as much as you can, while trying to to cause issues with anything else. Eventually the issue should be fixed at which point you can bring back the backups.

    So far, i can get a new notebook to sync but I am only trying a little bit of text. The affected documents are still not working.

    Edit:

    It seems to be stable for now. I can sync inc and a picture.

    Edit2: 

    Nope, it failed now. another corrupted notebook.

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  2. Anonymous
    2016-08-11T21:34:33+00:00

    I heavily depend upon Onenote. I have over 9GB of data on it. And I've been using it since 2009. This is why I do not like third-party clouds. I even pay for OneDrive! If they'd design it so that Onenote could be synced via third-party (with goodsync, for example) there could be an easy work-around. 

    I've still heard nothing from the email tech support. They have bad communication on their end.

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  3. Anonymous
    2016-08-11T21:48:49+00:00

    No help from Microsoft yet... The service I had on the phone deals with issues on OneDrive for business only. A service I also do have. But the impacted files are on a normal OneDrive, and there is no phone support there...

    I was referred to the "Contact us" page, where you need to click on Service and apps > OneDrive  and then wait for a chat support... Waiting time there goes up and down...

    Lessons learned today?

    1. Create frequent backups of OneNote documents. E.g. daily or twice a day.

    File > Settings > Backup > Frequency drop down.

    It also might be interesting to keep copies of previous backups, so if the most recent backup is already impacted... 2. Don't store important files on OneDrive, but use OneDrive for business instead if you can. 3. When a section is corrupt (and not opening in the online version), copy pages to another OneNote document and section before closing it on your device. That (I believe) is your only rescue action if your backup is old...

    Chat has started now, I wonder if it will bring any answers to my questions (see previous post).

     Bart

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  4. Anonymous
    2016-08-11T21:55:31+00:00

    Thank you Bart. Very helpful. Did not know there was a Business OneDrive. I'll check it out.

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  5. Anonymous
    2016-08-11T23:25:20+00:00

    It all started after my Windows 10 updated last night.

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