OUTLOOK.EXE Stays in Windows Task Manager after closing Outlook

[Guest]

When looking at the Windows Task Manager (WTM) running Processes, each
process for Office 200 Pro displays as it is opened and drops when the
program is closed (normal operation). This works perfectly for Word, Access,
Excel and Power Point. However, when I open Outlook and close it, the
process OUTLOOK.EXE remains active in the WTM Process list. If I open it
again, a second entry OUTLOOK.EXE is generated . I can repeat this 4-5
times and OUTLOOK.EXE will keep adding an open process. This only happens
with OUTLOOK. I have tried Detect and Repair, uninstall and reinstall and
nothing seems to work. I am running Windows XP Home SP2, with a Pentium 640
(3.2GHZ); 4GBM RAM. Does anyone have any idea how to correct this?

 

[Maurice N ~ MVP]

Give this a try. Use Task Manager & close all occurrences of Outlook.

Using XP's start menu, select RUN, then type in to open box

outlook.exe /safe <enter-key>

Let Outlook finish loading. See that it 'looks' normal. Do 'send and receive' one time. Outlook should look & act normal.
If not, a possibility is that you are having some problem downloading emails from your ISP. Perhaps a large email is getting stuck.

Now, make exit from Outlook. (file / close/ exit)

 

[Guest]

I tried your suggestion, but have exactly the same results - Note: that since
I have setup Word as the default, WINWORD.EXE opens along with OUTLOOK.EXE in
WTM, WINWORD.EXE drops when I close Outlook, but OUTLOOK.EXE remains. If I
open it again, either "normally" or using outlook.exe /safe, it just adds
another entry into the WTM. As for downloading large E-mail files, I am
running a Broadband, and can also check my mail via Webmail, never had a
problem. By the way, Outlook Express does not exhibit the “problemâ€, but I
need the capabilities of Outlook vs. Outlook Express. This one has me
baffled.

 

[Guest]

GOT IT FIXED!!!

While I don't know the "exact" cause, it appears that the problem was
related to my .pst file. If I reloaded Outlook, with no messages, etc.
(clean start), then Outlook would operate normally, i.e. Drop form the WTM
when closed). When I then used may backup .pst to regain all my old
messages, etc. The problem would come back.

What I did was load Outlook Express, transfer all messages, etc. and then
deleted Outlook completely. Reloaded Outlook, then transfered all mail from
Outlook Express back to the clean Outlook. This created a new complete .pst
file and the system now works. I obviously will delete the "old" backup .pst
files that were casuing the problem. There were a number of posting on this
issue and you will lose nothing by trying the above procedure, it worked for
me...finally.