Synching iphone/contacts & macbook/address book no longer works

I've had an iphone 3G and macbook pro for about 2 years and until now they've synched just fine. Today I cleaned up my address book on the mac (eliminated some duplicates, added, renamed, and deleted groups, updated individuals' information) and then synched my iphone with my mac using itunes. (I don't have a mobileme account.)
A few of the changes I made to address book (e.g., new contacts) were updated in contacts on the iphone, but most were not. It didn't update changes to existing contacts and the groups were not changed. Updates to ical and safari bookmarks were synched just fine.
Here are the things I've tried without success:
1. In itunes info tab, under address book I selected "all contacts," deselected all other updates (ical, etc.) except address book, and then synched.
2. Same as above, PLUS in the advanced section, under "replace information on this phone" I selected contacts. then I synched.
3. Same as #1 above, except instead of "all contacts" I selected "selected groups" and checked all the groups listed, and then synched.
4. I rebooted the macbook and repeated the steps above.
5. I opened isync and selected "reset sync history." then I repeated steps 1 and 2 above.
I also tested making a change to a contact on the iphone to see if the change was made on the mac. It was not.
About 2 months ago I upgraded to snow leopard. It's possible this problem has been going on since then, and I just didn't notice until today when I made all the changes to address book.
I don't know what to try next. Please help.

status update -- I tried a lot of other things but finally solved the problem after I removed all the groups from mac address book. (thank-you to my son Ben)
FYI -- along the way I tried doing the reset sync history, which deleted all contacts from the iphone. I initially thought that was a good thing, until I discovered that nothing I tried after that would put the contacts back on the iphone. Next I restored factory settings on the iphone and set up as a new user, but that didn't work either. Or maybe it did; maybe deleting the groups wouldn't have solved the problem if I hadn't deleted all contacts and reset the iphone first.

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Thanks Shep, wherever you are.
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Welcome to the Apple Community.
You might also take a look at this User Tip, to ensure you understand the differences between the different accounts in Address Book

Synching iphone/contacts & macbook/address book no longer works

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