OutlookExpress-CompactingMessages

[Guest]

How can I turn off the automatic compacting of messages and folders in OE6.
After using OE, it seems to come on and start compacting. It sure ties up the
computer and memory. Slows everything down and I occasionally have to reboot
- the run the compacting through on its own, takes an inordinate amount of
time.

Any help will be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

 

[Richard Urban [MVP]]

Automatic compacting of messages takes place every 100 times you close down
Outlook Express. That's inordinate? How often do you open and close the
program? You may consider adjusting your habits a bit. Most people I work
with open the program in the morning and close the program when they turn
off the computer at the end of the work day.

Anyway, there is no way to change this that I am aware of. BTW: Compacting
"speeds up" Outlook Express. If you want to speed it up even more, clean out
you folders of all the sent, deleted, received messages etc. That will get
you the largest gain in speed of opening and closing the program.

--
Regards,

Richard Urban
Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User

Quote from: George Ankner
"If you knew as much as you thought you know,
You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!"

 

[Jon]

Tools > Options> Maintenance

Cleaning up messages section

Jon

 

[Guest]

I must confess, Richard, that I do open and close it quite often. I will
start leaving it open all day. However, at one stage, pop up asked me whether
I wanted to compact or not "Yes" or "No". From then on, it was automatic.
I'll have to watch more closely, but it seems to come on more frequently than
once per 100 openings. Thanks for your advice.
Norm.

 

[Richard Urban [MVP]]

No problem. And it does take about 10 seconds to compact when there are many
messages saved in many folders.

--
Regards,

Richard Urban
Microsoft MVP Windows Shell/User

Quote from: George Ankner
"If you knew as much as you thought you know,
You would realize that you don't know what you thought you knew!"

 

[Rick \Nutcase\ Rogers]

Best look again, as the option for automatic compacting was removed. I
believe with SP2.

--
Best of Luck,

Rick Rogers, aka "Nutcase" - Microsoft MVP

Associate Expert - WindowsXP Expert Zone

Windows help - www.rickrogers.org

 

[Jon]

You may be right, but just had a quick look in the registry, and it does
look like there are some settings relating to background compaction

eg
"Background Compaction" (DWORD 1=on, 0 = off)
at
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Identities\{3750B9E7-DB22-485C-8640-3FE520544084}\Software\Microsoft\Outlook
Express\5.0

and
"Compact Do not Ask Again" (DWORD 1 or 0)

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Identities\{3750B9E7-DB22-485C-8640-3FE520544084}\Software\Microsoft\Outlook
Express\5.0\Dont Show Dialogs

The alphanumeric combination following the "Identities" will differ on your
machine

So setting the first of those to 0 and the second of those also to 0 would
change things.

Jon

 

[Gerry Cornell]

Richard

I am not certain about what is to follow. If you run File, Folder, Compact All at a time that suits you it resets to 100 so you do not get the system kicking in at an inconvenient moment.

--


Hope this helps.

Gerry
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[Gerry Cornell]

Jon

Was there but not in latest version of Outlook Express.

--


Regards.

Gerry

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[Jon]

Yes, looks like you are correct. Also, it looks like the previous registry
changes, I posted to Rick, don't affect the "compact after 100 uses of
Outlook Express" rule, either.

However, there's another key

"Compact Check Count"

at

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Identities\{3750B9E7-DB22-485C-8640-3FE520544084}\Software\Microsoft\Outlook
Express\5.0

(alphanumeric combination after "Identities" will again vary)

that seems to be the counter that counts up to the significant 100th time,
that triggers the compacting

So a periodic resetting of that key to say 1, either manually or
programmatically, would be another way of delaying / stopping the
compacting, in addition to the method Richard posted.


Jon



Jon

Was there but not in latest version of Outlook Express.

--


Regards.

Gerry

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Stourport, Worcs, England
Enquire, plan and execute.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[PA Bear]

Manual compacting does not reset the Compact Count.

Automatic Compacting in WinXP SP2 cannot be disabled.

- If you choose "Don't ask me again" when presented with the Automatic
Compacting prompt, it /will/ run automatically without the prompt the next
time.

- Do *not* attempt to close OE via Task Manager or shutdown while
Automatic Compacting is taking place or you risk loss of your (entire)
message store.

MS MVP Steve Cochran's OE Tool has a 'compact all folders' button: When
used, it resets the Compact Count.
http://www.oehelp.com/OETool/Default.aspx

OE - Reset Compact Check Count to 0 (Line 367, Left)
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/xp_tweaks.htm
--
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, AH-VSOP

 

[Jon]

oops .. that should have read "the method that you yourself posted"

Jon

 

[PA Bear]

Do *not* mess with those Registry keys/values.

 

[Jon]

I'll do what I like with my registry, thanks

Jon

 

[PA Bear]

OK, go for it. When you loose your message store, see
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/IE/community/columns/filecorruption.mspx
and http://www.oehelp.com/OETips.aspx#4. (I'd bookmark those two pages
IIWY.)

 

[Jon]

The first of those registry keys is ignored in SP2, and the second merely
turns a prompt on and off, so changing those 2 particular keys, to the
values I suggested, would not affect the message store at all.


If you'd read, and properly understood, the web pages you posted, then you
would also have read the following sections.

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/IE/community/columns/filecorruption.mspx#EDAA

http://www.oehelp.com/OETips.aspx#2

Both of which show that it is the compacting process itself, or rather its
untimely interruption, which is a major cause of message store corruption.
So disabling it completely, via the registry, (eg using the method I
outlined in another post in this conversation), is hardly likely to be a
cause of message store corruption.

So you can keep your technophobic, "don't touch the sacred registry"
approach to things.


Jon

 

[Guest]

I received a message to compact emails. After compacting I cannot view the
old emails in Inbox.

Please help on how I can view the old emails. Thanks.

 

[Ron Sommer]

Compact Do not Ask Again is not in my Registry.
That key must be before SP 2.
Background Compaction is in two unused Identities, but not in the Identity
that I use.
Not compacting will eventually get the message store in trouble.

 

[Gerry Cornell]

Sorry Bear there seems to be some conflict between your assertion and my
experience.


Regards.

Gerry

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[Gerry Cornell]

You may be able to recover your "lost" messages using an inexpensive
third party programme. Details of DBXtract in link cost $5 may help with
lost messages if the corrupted inbox is still on your computer.

http://www.tomsterdam.com/insideoe/problems/bugs.htm#mailgone


However, check first that the corrupted inbox is there. Using Windows XP
you need to enable show hidden files. Start, Control Panel,
Folder Options, View, Advanced Settings. Next enter Windows Explorer.
Using Tools, Find, Files and Folders search your C drive with
"inbo*.dbx" without quotes as the search criteria and see if you can
find more than one folder. Note the date / time stamp on the files and
the older folder will contain your missing messages. The original inbox
will appear as inbox. dbx. The next as inbox (01) dbx, then inbox (02)
dbx etc. The file extension can also appear as .dbt i.e. a temporary
folder.


~~~~~~


Hope this helps.

Gerry
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