Outlook pst folder missing

[thehammerman]

My computer froze and after a hard reset, Outlook 2002 indicated it could
not find my Outlook .pst file and thus could not open Outlook. I checked on
the .pst file size and it was zero bytes. Any idea how I can recover my
original file? I do not have a recent backup and have done miminal file
activity to my PC since this occured..

 

[Russ Valentine [MVP-Outlook]]

Take a look at these pages for info on Outlook data backup or transfer:
http://www.slipstick.com/config/backup.htm
http://www.howto-outlook.com/Howto/backupandrestore.htm
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/assistance/HA010771141033.aspx

 

[thehammerman]

Thanks for the info...unfortunately my outlook.pst file is 0 bytes (it was a
little over 1 GB with 7 years of data, before the computer froze using a
different user account), so it somehow got deleted or overwritten. I am
guessing that even though I was not in Outlook on the original user, that
perhaps the .pst file was still open when the PC hung on the 2nd user (PC is
setup to handled multiple users signed on), and it got corrupted. Any
recommended cheap disk recovery software to try to recover this .pst file
(or whatever parts of it may be still be fragmented out on the disk or left
in the NTFS file allocation table on my XP PC)? I have a backup of the .pst
file, but it is not too recent, so as last recourse if I can't recover, I'll
import it back into Outlook.

Take a look at these pages for info on Outlook data backup or transfer:
http://www.slipstick.com/config/backup.htm
http://www.howto-outlook.com/Howto/backupandrestore.htm
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/assistance/HA010771141033.aspx
--
Russ Valentine
[MVP-Outlook]

My computer froze and after a hard reset, Outlook 2002 indicated it could
not find my Outlook .pst file and thus could not open Outlook. I checked
on the .pst file size and it was zero bytes. Any idea how I can recover
my original file? I do not have a recent backup and have done miminal
file activity to my PC since this occured..

 

[Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]]

Did you search for ,pst files on your pc using the hidden files/folders
option in Windows search?

Also, do NOT import the .pst file, simply open it using Outlook's
File->Open->Outlook DAta file.

--
Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]

Post all replies to the group to keep the discussion intact.
ALWAYS post your Outlook version.
How to ask a question: http://support.microsoft.com/KB/555375


After furious head scratching, thehammerman asked:

| Thanks for the info...unfortunately my outlook.pst file is 0 bytes
| (it was a little over 1 GB with 7 years of data, before the computer
| froze using a different user account), so it somehow got deleted or
| overwritten. I am guessing that even though I was not in Outlook on
| the original user, that perhaps the .pst file was still open when the
| PC hung on the 2nd user (PC is setup to handled multiple users signed
| on), and it got corrupted. Any recommended cheap disk recovery
| software to try to recover this .pst file (or whatever parts of it
| may be still be fragmented out on the disk or left in the NTFS file
| allocation table on my XP PC)? I have a backup of the .pst file, but
| it is not too recent, so as last recourse if I can't recover, I'll
| import it back into Outlook.
|
|
| || Take a look at these pages for info on Outlook data backup or
|| transfer: http://www.slipstick.com/config/backup.htm
|| http://www.howto-outlook.com/Howto/backupandrestore.htm
|| http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/assistance/HA010771141033.aspx
|| --
|| Russ Valentine
|| [MVP-Outlook]
|| ||| My computer froze and after a hard reset, Outlook 2002 indicated it
||| could not find my Outlook .pst file and thus could not open
||| Outlook. I checked on the .pst file size and it was zero bytes.
||| Any idea how I can recover my original file? I do not have a
||| recent backup and have done miminal file activity to my PC since
||| this occured..

 

[Russ Valentine [MVP-Outlook]]

Obviously you transferred your data incorrectly and corrupted your PST file.
I posted the information so you would know how to restore your backup and
importing is decidedly the wrong way to do that. Please follow the
directions I posted instead.
--
Russ Valentine
[MVP-Outlook]

Thanks for the info...unfortunately my outlook.pst file is 0 bytes (it was
a little over 1 GB with 7 years of data, before the computer froze using a
different user account), so it somehow got deleted or overwritten. I am
guessing that even though I was not in Outlook on the original user, that
perhaps the .pst file was still open when the PC hung on the 2nd user (PC
is setup to handled multiple users signed on), and it got corrupted. Any
recommended cheap disk recovery software to try to recover this .pst file
(or whatever parts of it may be still be fragmented out on the disk or
left in the NTFS file allocation table on my XP PC)? I have a backup of
the .pst file, but it is not too recent, so as last recourse if I can't
recover, I'll import it back into Outlook.

Take a look at these pages for info on Outlook data backup or transfer:
http://www.slipstick.com/config/backup.htm
http://www.howto-outlook.com/Howto/backupandrestore.htm
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/assistance/HA010771141033.aspx
--
Russ Valentine
[MVP-Outlook]

My computer froze and after a hard reset, Outlook 2002 indicated it
could not find my Outlook .pst file and thus could not open Outlook. I
checked on the .pst file size and it was zero bytes. Any idea how I can
recover my original file? I do not have a recent backup and have done
miminal file activity to my PC since this occured..

 

[Rockingham500]

My computer froze and after a hard reset, Outlook 2002 indicated it could
not find my Outlook .pst file and thus could not open Outlook.  I checked on
the .pst file size and it was zero bytes.  Any idea how I can recover my
original file?  I do not have a recent backup and have done miminal file
activity to my PC since this occured..

Download File Restore Professional, select PST type in the filter. You
can then scan for all your lost PST files. The download is available
here: www.pcrecovery.com

 

[thehammerman]

Yes I did search, and the latest PST before the unexepcted deletion or
overwriting was not found, only old backups that are not recent. And yes, I
was planning to use the open data file using an old PST file instead of
importing the PST. Thus since the file somehow went from over 1 GB to 0
bytes after the hard reboot when it was frozen, I was just asking if there
is some disk utility to recover at least a large chunk, if not all of the
data of the overwritten pointer to the 1 GB PST file, since I would think
the PST file data is still on my hard disk.

Did you search for ,pst files on your pc using the hidden files/folders
option in Windows search?

Also, do NOT import the .pst file, simply open it using Outlook's
File->Open->Outlook DAta file.

--
Milly Staples [MVP - Outlook]

Post all replies to the group to keep the discussion intact.
ALWAYS post your Outlook version.
How to ask a question: http://support.microsoft.com/KB/555375


After furious head scratching, thehammerman asked:

| Thanks for the info...unfortunately my outlook.pst file is 0 bytes
| (it was a little over 1 GB with 7 years of data, before the computer
| froze using a different user account), so it somehow got deleted or
| overwritten. I am guessing that even though I was not in Outlook on
| the original user, that perhaps the .pst file was still open when the
| PC hung on the 2nd user (PC is setup to handled multiple users signed
| on), and it got corrupted. Any recommended cheap disk recovery
| software to try to recover this .pst file (or whatever parts of it
| may be still be fragmented out on the disk or left in the NTFS file
| allocation table on my XP PC)? I have a backup of the .pst file, but
| it is not too recent, so as last recourse if I can't recover, I'll
| import it back into Outlook.
|
|
| || Take a look at these pages for info on Outlook data backup or
|| transfer: http://www.slipstick.com/config/backup.htm
|| http://www.howto-outlook.com/Howto/backupandrestore.htm
|| http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/assistance/HA010771141033.aspx
|| --
|| Russ Valentine
|| [MVP-Outlook]
|| ||| My computer froze and after a hard reset, Outlook 2002 indicated it
||| could not find my Outlook .pst file and thus could not open
||| Outlook. I checked on the .pst file size and it was zero bytes.
||| Any idea how I can recover my original file? I do not have a
||| recent backup and have done miminal file activity to my PC since
||| this occured..

 

[thehammerman]

Thanks - I downloaded this file restore utility, but it was not able to find
any deleted or lost PST files. It found several data remnants that were a
few to several hundred MBs; however none when I reviewed them contained any
mail messages. Also none of the large files were around the 1GB+ last known
size of the .PST file, nor were any of the files found originally located in
the c:\document and settings\username\local settings\application
data\microsoft\outlook folder where the PST file somehow got zeroed out.

My computer froze and after a hard reset, Outlook 2002 indicated it could
not find my Outlook .pst file and thus could not open Outlook. I checked
on
the .pst file size and it was zero bytes. Any idea how I can recover my
original file? I do not have a recent backup and have done miminal file
activity to my PC since this occured..

Download File Restore Professional, select PST type in the filter. You
can then scan for all your lost PST files. The download is available
here: www.pcrecovery.com

 

[thehammerman]

Thanks - downloaded this program, and no deleted or lost PST files were
found. I am assuming that the original file somehow became overwritten and
erased to the point that the disk recovery programs (I tried another one
also from Paretologic Data Recovery) do not recognize the remaining sectors
as parts of a PST file structure. I have restored the previous .PST backup
I had from several months ago.

My computer froze and after a hard reset, Outlook 2002 indicated it could
not find my Outlook .pst file and thus could not open Outlook. I checked
on
the .pst file size and it was zero bytes. Any idea how I can recover my
original file? I do not have a recent backup and have done miminal file
activity to my PC since this occured..

Download File Restore Professional, select PST type in the filter. You
can then scan for all your lost PST files. The download is available
here: www.pcrecovery.com