Can't BackUp - Corrupted email Message Issue?

D

Dave Lee

My approach to Windows Mail backup was to simply copy the entire "Windows
Mail" folder to an external harddrive. When trying to do this tonight things
just "get stuck" - lots of disk chatter in the middle of things but nothing
happens with about 3 minutes left in the process (out of five). Things seem
to be hung up on my WindowsMail.MSMessageStore file, as best as I can
determine.

I have also tried to export my Mail Messages and I get an error message
about a corrupted file. I do have one email message from a couple of weeks
back (after my last backup) that I cannot delete ("Unknown Error Has
Occurred"). So I am guessing that this is the issue.

What are my alternatives here - both for backup and to get rid of the bad
message.

Thanks.

dave
 
G

Guest

Dave Lee said:
My approach to Windows Mail backup was to simply copy the entire "Windows
Mail" folder to an external harddrive. When trying to do this tonight
things just "get stuck" - lots of disk chatter in the middle of things but
nothing happens with about 3 minutes left in the process (out of five).
Things seem to be hung up on my WindowsMail.MSMessageStore file, as best
as I can determine.

I have also tried to export my Mail Messages and I get an error message
about a corrupted file. I do have one email message from a couple of weeks
back (after my last backup) that I cannot delete ("Unknown Error Has
Occurred"). So I am guessing that this is the issue.

What are my alternatives here - both for backup and to get rid of the bad
message.

Thanks.

dave
Click to expand...
In Windows Mail, unknown errors and undeletable messages are often due
to interference from an antivirus program. What if any antivirus programs
do you have, and have you ever had a Norton or McAfee antivirus program
installed on that computer?

For a temporary fix of the undeletable message problem, download and
install this hotfix with Windows Mail not running:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx/kb/941090

Although it's labelled as for mail stuck in the Outbox, it also works in
other folders. If you don't know whether you have a 32-bit version
of Vista or a 64-bit version, try the hotfix for the 32-bit version first.
The Vista SP1 update contains this hotfix and more, but takes longer
to install.
 
D

Dave Lee

Re: Attached

Thanks, I will give this fix a try. But I'm now wondering if this is really
the issue.

I was able to copy the entire Windows Mail folder to an empty folder on my
system drive. But I was unable to copy this copy to my external (USB
attached) harddrive (same symptoms). In the meantime the initial copy from
my working Windows Mail folder to the empty one took about 30 minutes
(400MB) which surprised me.

I do not have Norton or Macafee installed on my system. I do have Trend
Micro P-Cillin as a firewall and anti-virus on my system (as installed by
Dell - it is an XPS laptop), if that matters.

In the meantime I will try the fix - thanks.

dave
 
D

Dave Lee

Re: Attached

I have now installed the suggested fix and am able to delete the offending
message (thanks!).

But my symptoms are (basically) unchanged. I still can't just copy the
entire contents of my Windows Mail folder to my USB drive (seems to get
stuck - but lots of disk chatter).

So I started copying the contents of Windows Mail folder one file/folder at
a time. "Backup" folder went fine. The "Local Folders" folder is stuck
(estimated time is currently 7 days and 21 hours to complete - been stuck on
the same item for 10 minutes - can't tell what item it is exactly).

I'm not sure what to do at this point. Given what I know changing email
clients seems to be the only alternative as I really need a backup
methodology. Other suggestions?

Thanks again for the help.

dave
 
G

Gary VanderMolen

Make sure you have Vista's SP1 installed. It speeds up large
copying chores.

Trend Micro PC-Cillin is not compatible with Windows Mail.
I recommend you uninstall it (as a test) to see if that improves
the situation.

You may be able to use the 'File, Export, Messages' method if
you first get rid of that corrupted message. Use the Microsoft
fix: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/941090
Although it only mentions Outbox, it works for all mail folders.
 
D

Dave Lee

Make sure you have Vista's SP1 installed. It speeds up large
copying chores.

Trend Micro PC-Cillin is not compatible with Windows Mail.
I recommend you uninstall it (as a test) to see if that improves
the situation.

You may be able to use the 'File, Export, Messages' method if
you first get rid of that corrupted message. Use the Microsoft
fix: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/941090
Although it only mentions Outbox, it works for all mail folders.

--
Gary VanderMolen, MS-MVP

Thanks for your comments, Gary. And it does sound like SP1 would be
helpful.

At this point I have installed the referenced fix and got rid of the bad
message.

While I can't directly export messages to my USB attached drive, I was able
to export them to a local folder and then copy them over to my external
drive. Just at a glance I have discovered the following problems with the
final exported data.

1) It contains a folder that no longer exists
2) The final structure of the data appears (to me) to be different than it
shows in my Windows Mail Folders window - some subfolders are moved to other
places
3) Subfolders are empty (messages in them are not there in the exported
data)

I was able to copy my entire Windows Mail folder structure to a local
folder. Then I copied that to my external drive. Doing this presented two
"problems" (might not be problems - not sure)

1) Most of the data was transferred with the sytem warning that some
properties would be lost (have no idea how big an issue this might be)

2) The file tmp.edb was "in use" (have no idea by who - no other
applications were running). Since this seems to be some kind of temporary
file, I can imagine this being a non-issue.

I appreciate your warning about Trend P-Cillian capatibility. But given that
there are also warnings elsewhere about MacAfee and Norton it is hard to
avoid the conclusion that Windows Mail is typically incompatible with
security software.

Unless I run across some kind of breakthrough (that I trust) I think that I
have a hard decision to make here.

1) Change my habits so that I no longer keep critical data attached to
emails (I find this to have great organizational convenience for me - but I
could avoid this). In this case reliable backups would be less of a concern.

2) Find another email client that is reliably "backup-able" in my
environment.

Thanks again.

dave
 
G

Guest

Dave Lee said:
Make sure you have Vista's SP1 installed. It speeds up large
copying chores.

Trend Micro PC-Cillin is not compatible with Windows Mail.
I recommend you uninstall it (as a test) to see if that improves
the situation. [snip]
I appreciate your warning about Trend P-Cillian capatibility. But given
that there are also warnings elsewhere about MacAfee and Norton it is hard
to avoid the conclusion that Windows Mail is typically incompatible with
security software.

Unless I run across some kind of breakthrough (that I trust) I think that
I have a hard decision to make here.
Click to expand...
Windows Mail seems to be rather incompatible with any security software
that insists on email scanning. However, some of us have switched to using
antivirus programs that can be installed with the parts that scan email left
out, such as avast! and AVG, and don't have problems as a result.
 
D

Dave Lee

Dave Lee said:
Make sure you have Vista's SP1 installed. It speeds up large
copying chores.

Trend Micro PC-Cillin is not compatible with Windows Mail.
I recommend you uninstall it (as a test) to see if that improves
the situation. [snip]
I appreciate your warning about Trend P-Cillian capatibility. But given
that there are also warnings elsewhere about MacAfee and Norton it is
hard to avoid the conclusion that Windows Mail is typically incompatible
with security software.

Unless I run across some kind of breakthrough (that I trust) I think that
I have a hard decision to make here.
Click to expand...
Windows Mail seems to be rather incompatible with any security software
that insists on email scanning. However, some of us have switched to
using
antivirus programs that can be installed with the parts that scan email
left
out, such as avast! and AVG, and don't have problems as a result.
Click to expand...
Interesting info - could this somehow be related to my backup issues? The
problems that I am having would appear to be unrelated to email scanning.
But maybe these scanners hook into things deeper than you would think at a
glance.

Thanks for the response.

dave
 
G

Guest

Dave Lee said:
Dave Lee said:
Make sure you have Vista's SP1 installed. It speeds up large
copying chores.

Trend Micro PC-Cillin is not compatible with Windows Mail.
I recommend you uninstall it (as a test) to see if that improves
the situation. [snip]
I appreciate your warning about Trend P-Cillian capatibility. But given
that there are also warnings elsewhere about MacAfee and Norton it is
hard to avoid the conclusion that Windows Mail is typically incompatible
with security software.

Unless I run across some kind of breakthrough (that I trust) I think
that I have a hard decision to make here.
Click to expand...
Windows Mail seems to be rather incompatible with any security software
that insists on email scanning. However, some of us have switched to
using
antivirus programs that can be installed with the parts that scan email
left
out, such as avast! and AVG, and don't have problems as a result.
Click to expand...
Interesting info - could this somehow be related to my backup issues? The
problems that I am having would appear to be unrelated to email scanning.
But maybe these scanners hook into things deeper than you would think at a
glance.

Thanks for the response.

dave
Click to expand...
You're welcome.

It could also cause your backup problems. However, Windows Mail seems
to have a separate problem that often gives it problems with accessing
devices other than your main hard drive.
 
D

Dave Lee

Do yourself a favor and migrate away from Windows Mail.
Microsoft has virtually abandoned it, and no more upgrades
or bug fixes will be forthcoming.
The replacement program is Windows Live Mail (WLM):
http://get.live.com/wlmail/overview
It has many improvements and fixes compared to Windows Mail.
It also has excellent third party backup programs, such as:
http://www.staticbackup.com/windows-live-mail-backup

--
Gary VanderMolen, MS-MVP

That is my most probably course of action here. Just started to look into
it (again) and it now looks like it is out of beta. Is that right?

Thanks.

dave
 
G

Guest

It's been out of beta for months.

A good place to get more information about it is newsgroup:

microsoft.public.windows.live.mail.desktop
 
D

Dave Lee

It's been out of beta for months.

A good place to get more information about it is newsgroup:

microsoft.public.windows.live.mail.desktop
Click to expand...

Got it - thanks.

dave
 

Ask a Question

Want to reply to this thread or ask your own question?

You'll need to choose a username for the site, which only take a couple of moments. After that, you can post your question and our members will help you out.

Ask a Question

Similar Threads

Exporting Messages (and/or backup) Issue(s) 11
Message Store Folders Deleted 2
Lost my mail messages 3
HELP: Mail Backup 2
transferring mail data from one PC to another one 0
Backup mails 3
Can't get rid of files on Desktop 3
Email going to outbox, can't send 12

Top