Google Contacts won't Sync on my Android? - SOLVED
I'm having major problems trying to get my phone to sync with my Google Contacts! It gives me the error "Sync is currently experiencing problems. It will be back shortly." I've been getting this error for weeks. I've fed up with the way my Android phone keeps screwing up my contacts when it syncs with Facebook Contacts, Google Contacts AND my Phone and/or SIM contacts, so I want to use ONLY Google Contacts. I've taken the time to perfectly setup my Google Contacts with pictures, just the right contact details, everything, but now my phone won't sync them!!
Things that I've tried with no luck so far are:
- Uninstalled all Gmail App updates (my phone won't let me totally uninstall the Gmail app without doing something hacky, like rooting and using root uninstall type apps.)
- Reinstalled the Gmail App updates
- Cleared both the Gmail apps' Data and Cache
- Deleting and re-adding all of and sometimes JUST the affected accounts from the phone
- Exporting all of the contacts as a .vcf vCard from within Gmail, deleting all contacts from my phone, and then importing the vCard into my "People" app on my phone. That imported them all but their pictures wouldn't show up.
- Un-check and re-check the various sync options in the "Accounts & Sync settings".
- And probably a half dozen more things that I'm forgetting as I type this.
STILL, after all of that I get the same error message when trying to sync my Gmail Contacts and they don't get fully sync'd!! Has anyone ever come across this and figured out a solution? I would be forever indebted to you! 
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Heyas Olive,
You're looking in the wrong place (Gmail App); you need to Clear Data for the "Contacts Storage" app instead. (aha!)
Follow these steps (they may be just slightly different on different phones and/or versions of Android):
Goto Menu | Settings | Applications | Manage Applications
Tap the "Running" tab and look for "Contacts Storage"
"Clear Data" on it by tapping the button. The Cache is probably already 0.00B (bytes), but if not, go ahead and tap the Clear Cache button also
Go ahead now and do a sync, it WILL work.
Also, since you're wanting to only use Google Contacts to store and sync all of your contacts, then be sure to uncheck all of the corresponding boxes in Settings | Accounts & Sync, i.e. Facebook -> Sync Contacts, you'll want that one unchecked before you do a sync or it'll just mess your contacts all up again. Also, if you have an HTC phone that came with the Facebook for HTC app, even if you uncheck it's box, when you do a sync for some reason it ignores that you unchecked it and will STILL add all of your Facebook friends. I Removed that one from my phone for that exact reason (when you're looking at the apps' settings tap the "remove account" button), I use the official Facebook for Android app that you can download from the Android Market instead.
And like you've already mentioned, it's also best to fully delete all of your current contacts before doing any of the above steps, just so that you can start from a clean slate.