Outlook express crashes

[Guest]

If Outlook express is running when the screensaver comes on, the Outlook
express process crashes -- "shuts down incorrectly" -- including any messages
that are open for reading or for composing. This is extremely frustrating
and unproductive.

 

[Guest]

If you can judge when the fault first occurred you could try using System
Restore to set the system to the day before. It is a thing people often
forget to try and I hink it's one of the greatest advances. If you try it,
let us know if it works for you.

 

[Guest]

I have been living with this for months, and of course have made numerous
changes since then-- installing new software, upgrades, etc. If there was a
way to re-install OE without losing all of my existing messages, that might
work?

 

[Alias~-]

If Outlook express is running when the screensaver comes on, the Outlook
express process crashes -- "shuts down incorrectly" -- including any messages
that are open for reading or for composing. This is extremely frustrating
and unproductive.

Is the screen saver a native XP screen saver or one you downloaded from
the Net?

Alias

 

[Guest]

It's the "My Pictures" slideshow which comes with XP. I"m not even certain
it is the screensaver. Sometimes it seems to "quit" when I simply switch to
another window for a few minutes.

 

[Alias~-]

It's the "My Pictures" slideshow which comes with XP. I"m not even certain
it is the screensaver. Sometimes it seems to "quit" when I simply switch to
another window for a few minutes.

Some questions, then:

1. Do you use an anti spam program with OE?

2. Do you have your anti virus checking emails?

3. When was the last time you compacted your messages in OE?

4. Do you store messages in Sent Items, Inbox, Deleted Items or Drafts?

5. When was the last time you did a clean up and defrag for your hard drive?

Alias

 

[Guest]

1. Do you use an anti spam program with OE?

*I am using a "whitelist" program -- Qurb. It doesn't do anything until
messages are received and then only shunts them off to a folder>

2. Do you have your anti virus checking emails?

Yes. McAfee. Again that should only apply at the time messages are
received, and I now have the setting for downloading of e-mail set to three
hours.>

3. When was the last time you compacted your messages in OE?

That was a few months ago and when I did it I lost almost all of my
messages. It is now asking to compact my mail folders again and I have been
refusing to do so.>

4. Do you store messages in Sent Items, Inbox, Deleted Items or Drafts?

*Everything I send ends up in sent items and that folder gets quite large.
I sometimes get behind in answering e-mails and there are quite a few
messages in the inbox. Deleted items are cleared on exit, and I don't have
that many drafts. I do have other folders where I store or e-mail for
various projects and categories, and those can get quite large.>

5. When was the last time you did a clean up and defrag for your hard drive?

*two days ago. I try to do it once a week or so.>

 

[Alias~-]

*I am using a "whitelist" program -- Qurb. It doesn't do anything until
messages are received and then only shunts them off to a folder>

Disable it.

Yes. McAfee. Again that should only apply at the time messages are
received, and I now have the setting for downloading of e-mail set to three
hours.>

Disable it. It offers no additional protection.

That was a few months ago and when I did it I lost almost all of my
messages. It is now asking to compact my mail folders again and I have been
refusing to do so.>

Do you have a way to back up your messages? If not, just copy ALL the
..dbx files into a new folder on your hard drive. Do this from
time-to-time, overwriting the old .DBX files. Do this with OE closed.

*Everything I send ends up in sent items and that folder gets quite large.
I sometimes get behind in answering e-mails and there are quite a few
messages in the inbox. Deleted items are cleared on exit, and I don't have
that many drafts. I do have other folders where I store or e-mail for
various projects and categories, and those can get quite large.>

Don't let them get over 100MB in size and create new folders for the
messages in any default folders and move all the messages into the new
folders.

Copy your .dbx files to a new folder on your hard drive with OE closed.
Then open OE and close it and allow it to compact. While it is
compacting do not touch your mouse or keyboard for any reason. Always do
a back up before compacting messages.

Download OE Tool -- free -- and use it to compact manually from time to
time and it will reset the count and you will never see that "do you
want to compact your messages" prompt that you get with every 100
closings of OE.

OE Tool:

http://www.oehelp.com/OETool/Default.aspx

Alias

 

[PA Bear]

Is the machine fully up-to-date at Windows Update?

General OE Caveats:

- Don't use Inbox or Sent Items to archive messages. Move them to local
folders created for this purpose.

- Empty Deleted Items folder daily.

- Disable Background Compacting [N/A in SP2] and frequently perform a manual
compact of all OE folders while "working offline". More at
http://www.insideoe.com/files/maintain.htm

- WinXP SP2 only: Do not attempt to close OE via Task Manager or shutdown
your machine if Automatic Compacting is taking place.

- WinXP SP2 only: If your machine is fully up-to-date at Windows Update,
installing the following patch (KB918766) will help to avoid such data loss
in the future:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=86b68a78-f325-4a95-98c2-98af2256ccc3

This patch will be included in the next Cumulative Update for Outlook
Express/WinXP SP2.

- Your anti-virus application's email scanning feature can also cause
corruption. Disable it. It provides no additional protection.
--
OE6-specific newsgroup:
news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.windows.inetexplorer.ie6_outlookexpress
OE General newsgroup:
news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.outlookexpress.general

~Robear Dyer (PA Bear)
MS MVP-Windows (IE/OE, Security, Shell/User)