Windows Phone deploy Issue

Question

I have a strange issue that I can not seem to find any record of but it has now happened to me on two separate machines! I am building Windows Phone 8.1 apps and testing them on a physical device. This works fine for a time until at some point with no warning i am unable to deploy to the phone and the console shows the errors below!

Error : DEP6100 : The following unexpected error occurred during bootstrapping stage 'Connecting to the device '30F105C9-681E-420b-A277-7C086EAD8A4E'.': SmartDeviceException - Deployment failed because no Windows Phone was detected. Make sure a phone is connected and powered on. 

Error : DEP6200 : Bootstrapping 'Device' failed. Device cannot be found. Deployment failed because no Windows Phone was detected. Make sure a phone is connected and powered on.        

Now this would lead me to believe that the cable has fallen out or its just become disconnected however it hasn't and im sure of that because i can still use it as a storage device to transfer pictures. Restarting the devices has zero effect and the only thing that worked on the first machine i tried was reformatting the pc and starting from scratch which i really dont have the time to do again!

Answer 1

I had the same problem but solved it. Went to Control Panel > Device manager > Portable devices and uninstalled the phone. Plugged the phone back in and everything worked on both 2013 and 2015 Community.

It's taken me all day to find this though :-)

Answer 2

I've had some problems sometimes registering some WP devices as developer devices. I've never had this particular error, but maybe this will work.

When the device is connected to the computer, in the taskbar click in the icon which shows that a device is connected (the one where you can "Safely remove" the device) and right click on it and select the show devices and printers option. When it opens, you will see all the windows phone devices you have connected to the computer. Disconnect your device and uninstall it and its drivers by selecting the appropriate option after right clicking on it.

Connect it again, it should now install its drivers again.

Update 1 :-

Answer 3

I sometimes get that, too. Here's how I fix it (phone remains connected via USB)

1. switch phone to airplane mode, then deploy. If that fails:
2. switch phone to airplane mode, reboot phone, stay in airplane mode, then deploy