Recovering Master Category List 'after' reformatting C

[middlebear]

I have made a "ghost" copy of my computer to an external hard drive, then
reformatted "C" and reinstalled everything, via original disks (Win XP),
including Outlook 2002. By making a ghost copy, I have a fully functional
external hard drive. If I connect it via the USB to the computer, partitions
receive a new letter in sequence. The old C drive is now S in the external
drive and all the files are fully accessible, except, as it turns out, access
to the old registry.

In this process I lost all my own Categories in the Outlook Contact book,
even so they were included in the Master Category list. I have copied the
file mycomputer. wab to the right location. This has restored my Categories
to the list in Outlook, but each one says "Not in Master Category List".

I understand - now, too late - that I should have saved the registry entry
where the Categories are stored. It really makes no sense that such good
function has been supplied, and the means to save it are so absurdly
difficult.

Now I can't access the old registry entries, because when I type
Run/Regedit, it always goes to the registry in my C drive, not to the
registry in the S drive

I have also - after creating a Restore point - tried to copy the old
NTuser.dat file from S to C, but it says that the file is being used, so it
can't be moved/copied/replaced.
Had hoped that this file would automatically alter the registry, but find no
way to do this.

Is there a solution to this vexing issue at this stage? I can ghost back and
have my computer exactly as it was 3 days ago, but then I have another 3 days
of work ahead of me until all the reformatting and re-installing is done
again.

Many thanks,

 

[Brian Tillman [MVP-Outlook]]

I have made a "ghost" copy of my computer to an external hard drive, then
reformatted "C" and reinstalled everything, via original disks (Win XP),
including Outlook 2002. By making a ghost copy, I have a fully functional
external hard drive. If I connect it via the USB to the computer, partitions
receive a new letter in sequence. The old C drive is now S in the external
drive and all the files are fully accessible, except, as it turns out,
access
to the old registry.

In this process I lost all my own Categories in the Outlook Contact book,
even so they were included in the Master Category list. I have copied the
file mycomputer. wab to the right location. This has restored my Categories
to the list in Outlook, but each one says "Not in Master Category List".

There is no such thing as an "Outlook Contact Book". State what you really
mean. The WAB file you copied also has nothing to do with Outlook. That is
Outlook Express's address book. Outlook's contacts are in the Contacts
folder, which will by default be in the PST file you used on the old C drive.
The current location is the (probably hidden) folder S:\Documents and
Settings\youroldusername\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook.
Look for your PST there, connect it to your existing mail profile as the
delivery location, and you'll have all the Outlook data back.

I understand - now, too late - that I should have saved the registry entry
where the Categories are stored. It really makes no sense that such good
function has been supplied, and the means to save it are so absurdly
difficult.

Now I can't access the old registry entries, because when I type
Run/Regedit, it always goes to the registry in my C drive, not to the
registry in the S drive

Why not boot from your S drive, perform your MCL extraction, then reboot to
your new C drive and add the MCL to your current registry?

 

[Michael Bauer [MVP - Outlook]]

Additionally to Brian, if you can boot from the external drive, do so, open
the registry, navigate to
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\10.0\Outlook\Categories

and click File/Export. That will create a *.reg file which can be imported
on your new system simply by a double click on it. But be aware that doing
so will overwrite the existing master category list.

If you cannot boot from the external drive and want to save some time, you
can use Category Manager, which supports to write all of the categories you
have assigned to your contacts back into your master category list. For this
the free trial is sufficient. For details see the link in my signature,
please.

If you want to merge the mentioned *.reg file with our new mcl, you can also
use Category Manger.

--
Best regards
Michael Bauer - MVP Outlook
Manage and share your categories:
<http://www.vboffice.net/product.html?pub=6&lang=en>


Am Fri, 5 Feb 2010 17:48:01 -0800 schrieb middlebear: