Recently I was being bugged by OneDrive not starting; as a O365 user I wasn’t able to use OneDrive with NGSC (Next Generation Sync Client) to download files on the go.

If you face a similar situation, follow these steps, in this particular order – if possible.

• Navigate to HKCU\Software\Microsoft\OneDrive & delete it. i.e, Delete the OneDrive registry keys under the Microsoft folder.
• Use Revo Uninstaller, while I used the pro version, the free version can also be used; no difference. Just run it, pre-configure it to do a back up of the registry and also a system restore point. It will try and run the native uninstaller & nothing will happen. Once you see the ‘Scan/Next’, click on it and remove all registry keys and left over files it displays.
• Sign Out & Reboot.
• Do not download the usual OneDrive installer from https://onedrive.live.com/about/en-in/download, that will be 24,XXX KB on disk; this is unusable. Get the one from here https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/p/?linkid=844652, it should be 25,239 KB on disk. Install this, open OneDrive settings & click on “Add an account”
• Navigate to C:\Users\Karthikeyan\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs & delete all previous OneDrive shortcuts. Goes without saying, replace my name with your user directory name.
• Create a new shortcut and point it to C:\Users\Karthikeyan\AppData\Local\Microsoft\OneDrive\OneDrive.exe
• Pin this new shortcut to the start screen or to the taskbar & use this to launch OneDrive moving forward.

That is all! Now you can actually use OneDrive as it is supposed to work 🙂

Hat-Tip to the following sources:

LincolnLog’s reply – https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windows/en-US/09425bf9-55ee-4ade-831c-b4650799dd59/a-newer-version-of-onedrive-is-installed?forum=win10itprogeneral

Someone in UV – https://onedrive.uservoice.com/forums/262982-onedrive-archive/suggestions/18734299-fix-a-newer-version-is-installed-and-onedrive-fa