OUTLOOK 2003 problems....

Everytime I go to open up my Outlook 2003 I get the following message:

The data file "Personal Folder" was not closed properly. This file is being checked for problems.

When Outlook finally opens up it won't let me download new email or delete any old ones. It eventually will freeze up all windows. I then have to reboot my laptop in order to do anything.



Can someone help me?


-Thanks
M


Dell Inspiron 600m
XP Professional
Outlook 2003

I don't personally have a cure for this so can't really guide as such, but from a search I found that you may need to create a new account and then move the files etc over, here is the link I found, hope it helps.
http://www.outlook-tips.net/howto/profile.htm

To me that doesn't sound like a good idea. Does anyone else have any suggestions?

Hi, it is of course your call…..after all its your machine! However the steps outlined in the link provided by 8210GUY is a reasonable first thing to do when faced with this sort of problem. How did you get on with running your machine in safe mode? and also fixing the problems you were experiencing with Windows Picture & Fax viewer? (as outlined in your other topics, open here on WTT) Regards paws

if I do all that on what 8210guy said……….. will I lose all my emails in my outlook account? It is important I save them all. When I put it in safe mode outlook still takes forever and ends up freezing up

Right been looking around for clues with this, but if the emails are important please await confirmation from others who know more than I do about this area, but logically you should not lose anything, to lose something you'd have to delete it (not counting corruption as thats out of our control), and as from what I can understand from the above all you will be doing is creating a new user account initially, so the old one will still be there, therefore that data will be as well, but do wait for confirmation to be safe.

Now looking around a suggestion is that this error is often associated with add in's, so try disabling these by clicking on Tools -Options - Other - Advanced Options - Add-In Manager and COM Add-Ins, unfortunately I don't have that version so I can't check and see what you will, so you will hopefully be able to use common sense and see if this helps.
Another thought, have you looked in the event logs to see if that offers any clues ? click Start - Control Panel - Admin Tools - Event Viewer.

I also saw the following suggested:-

Try starting Outlook in safe mode. Click Start>Run. Enter "outlook.exe
/safe" (without the quotes but with the space) in the Open field and click
OK. Does the problem still occur?

Source.

Another comment I've seen about the 07 version, is to open outlook, and leave it open, then shut down the system, do NOT close outlook yourself, let the system do it, the suggestion is that letting the system do it that may satisfy the error to a proper closing of it, with luck anyway, but this one should be safe to try without confirmation because your not changing anything, your simply opening the program, then shutting down the system, but I really hope something here helps anyway.

I am still having problems. I am now wondering if I install/upgrade to Outlook 2007 on top of this will it lose my emails and contacts? Will that solve my problem?

The problem is that where corruption etc comes into play the are no guaranteed answers, and I don't have the expertise to guide you more than I have already, the best advice I can offer at this stage is to create a back up of your mail and address book etc, anything thats important to you, then give it a go, worst case you can completely uninstall it and install afresh again, then you can restore the backed up details and hopefully have no more problems, maybe one of the other guys has a better idea, but thats what I would do if I was in your situation, hope you get it sorted anyway.

Hi , If your outlook .pst file is corrupt, then you may have already lost some of your emails etc ( but there are some repair utilities that may help) Make a back up copy now of your .pst file and keep it safe in the same place that you have kept all your other .pst file backups and take an extra copy and keep on removable media………This will at least help protect your position. Next follow the directions given by 8210GUY for setting up a new account and then import your old. pst file and see how you go Regards paws

Hi Everyone, I'm having exactly the same problem as Meme. I'm going to try the suggestions on here but I don't know how to save the pst file, can you help?

Had a look on the internet and found out how to save the pst file but a box comes up saying it can't copy it: data error (cyclic redundancy check). no idea what that means…….help!

Here are two Microsoft articles that may help you solve your problem:

1. How to automatically back up your personal folders file in Outlook 2000 and Outlook 2003

2. Use the Inbox Repair tool - Outlook - Microsoft Office Online


The answers to most of your questions in regards to this matter and to the one pertaining to losing your emails if you upgrade to Outlook 2007 can be found through Google. Example, for the first one, I Googled "Backup PST file Outlook 2003"

I hope the references help.