As a nice feature in ActiveSync, it is possible to backup and restore your device (e.g. HP iPaq 2410hx) information. In case of ’sudden’ destruction of data on your PDA you can restore the information back to the PDA.

When I tried to restore information to my PDA, I got the following error:

Restore: Invalid Storage File Version
The selected backup file was created by an incompatible version of backup. Please select another storage file.

This is an odd message, because the backup was created with exact the same ActiveSync version, same computer, same cradle. The only difference was that my PDA had a hard reset. I tried several different things to resolve this issue. One of them was using the same DeviceID before restoring, another one was deleting al partnerships with the PDA and starting all over. None of them helped.

Solution

The solution was in fact very simple. The backup was created with a different regional setting. After the hard reset, the default regional settings of the PDA were back, English (United States) if I’m correct.

I changed the regional settings to my own setting, that is Dutch (Netherlands), and tried a restore. And ofcourse… it worked.