Location of Deleted E-Mails

[Gene L.]

I inadvertently deleted several E-Mail messages some time ago and was
wondering if they might still be accessible somewhere on my C-Drive. I am
using 2007 Office Outlook and Windows Vista Home Premium. Where might I look
to determine if they are still there. I would like to know the path if that
is the way to look. Many thanks for the help.
Gene L.

 

[DL]

Outlook deleted mail is stored in the Outlook Deleted folder, which you can
see within outlook in folder view.
Although you may have permanently deleted, or you may have emptied the
deleted folder.

But then you maybe using an imap account, in which case they are on the imap
server, unless you purged the folders.

 

[Hank Arnold]

I inadvertently deleted several E-Mail messages some time ago and was
wondering if they might still be accessible somewhere on my C-Drive. I
am using 2007 Office Outlook and Windows Vista Home Premium. Where might
I look to determine if they are still there. I would like to know the
path if that is the way to look. Many thanks for the help.
Gene L.

Deleted e-mails are stored in the "Deleted Items" folder. If you haven't
set Outlook to empty that folder, you should be able to get it back from
there.

If you've emptied it, then your only hope is that you leave the mail on
your mail server. If you delete them when you download, you are SOL....

--

Regards,
Hank Arnold
Microsoft MVP
Windows Server - Directory Services
http://mypcassistant.blogspot.com/

 

[R. C. White]

Hi, Gene.

When all else fails...Command Prompt! Using the modern equivalents of the
ancient MS-DOS commands.

At a Command Prompt:
Dir C:\*.eml /s /a

This starts at the Root of Drive C: and lists all the files that have the
..eml extension, no matter how deep they may be in a directory tree and no
matter what Attributes may have been set. If there is an .eml file on C:
(even in the Recycle Bin), this will list it. If C: is a big drive with
lots of files, it may take a while.

If your WLM Message Store is there, you may see a very long list of every
email you ever got. But you can revise that Dir command to fine-tune your
search. Type Dir /? to see a mini-Help file that lists all the switches and
parameters available with that command - just like for any command in a
Command Prompt window.

For email programs other than WM or WLM, but you may need to search for .dbx
(OE) or .pst (Outlook) or some other extension. I don't have much
experience with Outlook and my memory of OE and WM is fading fast. And I
have no idea how long "some time ago" might be in this case.

RC
--
R. C. White, CPA
San Marcos, TX
(e-mail address removed)
Microsoft Windows MVP
Windows Live Mail 2009 (14.0.8089.0726) in Win7 Ultimate x64

 

[Gene L.]

Hi, Gene.

When all else fails...Command Prompt! Using the modern equivalents of the
ancient MS-DOS commands.

At a Command Prompt:
Dir C:\*.eml /s /a

This starts at the Root of Drive C: and lists all the files that have the
.eml extension, no matter how deep they may be in a directory tree and no
matter what Attributes may have been set. If there is an .eml file on C:
(even in the Recycle Bin), this will list it. If C: is a big drive with
lots of files, it may take a while.

If your WLM Message Store is there, you may see a very long list of every
email you ever got. But you can revise that Dir command to fine-tune your
search. Type Dir /? to see a mini-Help file that lists all the switches
and parameters available with that command - just like for any command in
a Command Prompt window.

For email programs other than WM or WLM, but you may need to search for
.dbx (OE) or .pst (Outlook) or some other extension. I don't have much
experience with Outlook and my memory of OE and WM is fading fast. And I
have no idea how long "some time ago" might be in this case.

RC
--
R. C. White, CPA
San Marcos, TX
(e-mail address removed)
Microsoft Windows MVP
Windows Live Mail 2009 (14.0.8089.0726) in Win7 Ultimate x64

RC
Many thanks for the help. I am an old timer who is very familiar with the C
prompt. I even remember when there was no mouse and nothing but DOS. You
have been a big help.
Regards:
Gene L.