a) Yes, as long as your original configuration is healthy of course but that
is the same for most options in order to work reliable ;-)
I'm not sure what you mean with your second suggestion. You can archive
manually as well of course and then you can be as selective as you want to
be yourself. Personally; I don't use AutoArchive and my pst-file is
currently about 2.5GB. For me it is more convenient, not slow in performance
and not slow for backing up. But your mileage my vary of course based on
your configuration.
b) Actually your understanding should be the other way around. By default
Outlook only has the archive.pst. Any additional archive files are the ones
you have configured yourself or are from other mail profiles for which you
have archiving enabled.
Why not simply look what is in those archive files?
Use File-> Open-> Outlook Data File...
--
Robert Sparnaaij [MVP-Outlook]
Coauthor, Configuring Microsoft Outlook 2003
http://www.howto-outlook.com/
Outlook FAQ, HowTo, Downloads, Add-Ins and more
http://www.msoutlook.info/
Real World Questions, Real World Answers
-----
"Jorge Cervantes" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed)...
> I have two questions on archiving pst file.
>
> a) Is auto-archiving reliable? Which method is reliable between manual
> and auto archiving? Your suggestion would be appreciated.
>
> b) When I looked at Outlook folder, there were a few archived pst files
> already: archive5.pst, archive6.pst and archive.pst.
> I understand the numbered archives but I do not what the un-numbered
> archive.pst is. Could someone explain what archive.pst is about?
>
> Jorge
>