XP PRO and Outlook Express PANIC

[AT and HMB]

When email was started this morning I have nothing in:
Inbox, Outbox, Sent Items etc.
Tools/Options/mtce/Store Folder show correct location for messages and other
folders seem to be OK.
In Windows Explorer my message folder shows:

Inbox (1).dbx 55,053KB 09/10/2007 16.38

Inbox.dbx 331KB 10/10/2007 10.42

Sent Items (1).dbx 32,378 09/10/2007 16.38

Sent Items (2).dbx 137KB 06/04/2006 18.35

Sent Items (3).dbx 139KB 10/10/2007 10.42

Also, a folder I created recently in top group has disappeared. This is
shown in Explorer as:

(folder name) 587KB 09/10/2007 16.44

I have a full copy of my message folder for security and know my way round
Explorer and can ensure integrity of the message folder.

I intended, (for example), to transpose contents of Inbox (1) with Inbox, as
an experiment but I am unhappy doing this without knowing what is going on.
The time of 16.38 yesterday is probably right for the last time the Inbox
was used.

I just don't know what is happening: why have I got 3 Sent Items files?

The sytem was closed down last night without problem. My wife booted the
sytem this morning and I know that she looked at OE before booting was
complete, i.e. the System Tray had not completely filled up. But this has
happened regularly before without any implications.

Help please quickly.

Thanks.

 

[Pegasus \(MVP\)]

When email was started this morning I have nothing in:
Inbox, Outbox, Sent Items etc.
Tools/Options/mtce/Store Folder show correct location for messages and
other folders seem to be OK.
In Windows Explorer my message folder shows:

Inbox (1).dbx 55,053KB 09/10/2007 16.38

Inbox.dbx 331KB 10/10/2007 10.42

Sent Items (1).dbx 32,378 09/10/2007 16.38

Sent Items (2).dbx 137KB 06/04/2006 18.35

Sent Items (3).dbx 139KB 10/10/2007 10.42

Also, a folder I created recently in top group has disappeared. This is
shown in Explorer as:

(folder name) 587KB 09/10/2007 16.44

I have a full copy of my message folder for security and know my way round
Explorer and can ensure integrity of the message folder.

I intended, (for example), to transpose contents of Inbox (1) with Inbox,
as an experiment but I am unhappy doing this without knowing what is going
on. The time of 16.38 yesterday is probably right for the last time the
Inbox was used.

I just don't know what is happening: why have I got 3 Sent Items files?

The sytem was closed down last night without problem. My wife booted the
sytem this morning and I know that she looked at OE before booting was
complete, i.e. the System Tray had not completely filled up. But this has
happened regularly before without any implications.

Help please quickly.

Thanks.

In your list of crossposts you omitted the newsgroup where you are most
likely to find OE experts: The OE newsgroup. Lots of very knowledgeable
people there!

 

[Gerry]

Outlook Express comprises any number of dbx folders. One for each
newsgroup, an inbox, a sent items, a deleted items, a folders index and
any number of user created local folders. You need to compact all
Outlook Express folders regularly especially as you are downloading
newsgroup messages.

The easiest way to do this is to place the cursor on Outlook Express in
the Folder List, select File, Work Offline followed by File, Folder,
Compact All.

It sounds like you are allowing Compacting to take place or you are
trying to use Outlook Express whilst compacting is in progress. This
can lead to e.g. a number of corrupted files.

Is there any evidence of folder corruption? 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.

http://www.insideoe.com/problems/bugs.htm#mailgone
Place the cursor on Outlook Express in the Folder List and select
File, Work Offline, and then File, Folder, Compact All. The process
does take a time and you should NOT try to use or stop the process
until it completes. Doing this resets the counter so that automatic
compacting will not be started until Outlook Express has been opened
and closed another 100 times.

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

--



Hope this helps.

Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England
Enquire, plan and execute
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[AT and HMB]

Thanks for reply Gerry.
I NEVER allow OE to compact for me automatically, indeed I always use
"cancel" when prompted.
When I periodically compact I put folders offline and then choose "compact
all folders"
Because I need to do something quickly I will now compact using the copy of
my message folder.
I will come back on this.
Again thanks

 

[AT and HMB]

Compacting did nothing.
I renamed the Inbox (1) to Inbox and that was successful. I tried the same
with the Sent but that was not successful. Strange.
I will now look at the thing in some detail.
I did not know that there was an XP OE. I must have missed it. I used to use
the 98 OE.
Thanks again.

 

[PA Bear]

Why it happens:

http://insideoe.tomsterdam.com/problems/bugs.htm#mailgone
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/IE/community/columns/filecorruption.mspx

Recovering the missing data: http://www.oehelp.com/OETips.aspx (#2 and #4)
and http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=918069 (Notes section under
Resolution)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
DBXpress (faster, more powerful, with even greater functionality)
http://www.oehelp.com/DBXpress/Default.aspx
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Avoiding Such Corruption in Future:

- Don't use Inbox or Sent Items to archive messages. Move them to local
folders created for this purpose.

- Empty Deleted Items folder daily.

- Disable Background Compacting [not available in SP2] and frequently
perform a manual compact of all OE folders while "working offline". More at
http://www.insideoe.com/files/maintain.htm

- WinXP SP2 only: Do not shut down your machine while Windows is
automatically compacting your message store.

- Your anti-virus application's email scanning feature can also cause such
corruption. Disable it. It provides no additional protection.
--
OE-specific newsgroup:
news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.outlookexpress.general

~Robear Dyer (PA Bear)
MS MVP-Windows (IE, OE, Security, Shell/User)

 

[Gerry]

I am not sure you are understanding the process. If a folder has
corrupted and it is a system generated dbx folder the system
automatically generates a replacement. Inbox.dbx is a system created dbx
file. If Inbox.dbx corrupts the original file remains but Outlook
Express can not open and does not remove the file. It is also not
allowed by the operating system to create a dbx file in the same folder
with the same name. The problem is overcome by created a dbx file and
naming it Inbox (1).dbx. If it happens again it is named Inbox (2).dbx
and so on. The user may not be aware that a replacement Inbox has been
created although they usually notice that messages they thought were
there are no longer there. The contents of each will be different as
they only contain messages placed there whilst the file was current and
not corrupted. Messages can be recovered as explained in my earlier link
from a corrupted dbx file.

In addition to Inbox.dbx other system created files included Sent
Items.dbx, Deleted Items.dbx and Folder.dbx. User created Local Folders
are not automatically generated if the original corrupts.

Dbx files which have not been compacted can become very large and this
increases the risk of corruption. Storage of mail to be retained should
not be left in system generated folders. They are safer archived in user
created Local Folders.

I would suggest you do not use the Cancel button to stop automatic
compaction. The compaction process can take a while to stop. Compacting
uses a lot of memory and processor capacity, which means that the
message telling it to stop when you cancel often has had no affect when
you come to do something else e.g. switch off the computer. This is when
corruption can easily occur. The best way to avoid automatic compaction
is to manually compact before closing the computer 100 times triggers
the process.

--



Hope this helps.

Gerry
~~~~
FCA
Stourport, England
Enquire, plan and execute
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

[AT and HMB]

thanks gerry.
Perhaps you misunderstood me.
I would never cancel once anything like that had begun.
I compact periodically offlinel The reason I don't let it acaivate when
asked at close of OE is that BEFORE compaction I ALWAYS take a full copy to
another folder in Explorer and I build the date into the folder name to
remind me of the action. I then compact offline.
Although I play safe by taking a copy of the full message folder, I must
admit that I have never had a problem. Maybe I play too safe.
I am aware of the (1), (2), (3) thing. I just find it intriguing that in a
situation where neither Inbox or Sent was available to me this morning,
that:
Renaming Inbox (3) to Inbox worked. Renaming (eventually) Sent items (1) to
(3) also worked. It is not difficult to ascertain where the files are as the
date will give a clue. However it is not clear to me why Inbox (without
brackets) worked and Sent items worked with brackets (3).
As a precaution I am working just now with the copy of the Message file. I
tried to import the missing folder from the original Message folder but it
is not seen by OE.
I appreciate the help people are giving me, but I am not able to spend hours
chasing this. I will just have to do without this file even although it is
recent and important.
Incidentally, while renaming the Inbox and Sent files I got mention of
corrupt Recycle bin which I find surprising as I always delete by pressing
shift+delete and never have involvement with recycling.

 

[PA Bear]

If you /regularly/ compact all OE folders manually, you'll never see
Automatic Compacting, which only occurs if you've not compacted manually
before closing OE 99 times. When you compact manually, the CompactCount is
automatically reset to 0 (zero).
--
OE-specific newsgroup:
news://msnews.microsoft.com/microsoft.public.outlookexpress.general

~Robear Dyer (PA Bear)
MS MVP-Windows (IE, OE, Security, Shell/User)

 

[AT and HMB]

PA Bear.
Thanks.
I wasn't aware of the count so that now fits in with the experience and it
is true that perhaps a month has elapsed since I last compacted. Is that too
long a time? Like many people 99% of our emails are spam and I
"shift+delete" them immediately.
After doing compaction yesterday, I noticed in Explorer that several files
had not been changed to the current date, which seems to indicate that these
are the files that OE cannot see.
As there are too many to write off I will now pursue your URL to (hopefully)
effect recovery.
Thanks again.