Corrupt outlook express 6 inbox

andrspalma

andrspalma

andrspalma

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24 Nov 2015
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My inbox is completely erased after last night's windows update restart. I tried to reimport the inbox.dbx file but keep getting "no messages can be found" error. tried to copy the .dbx file else where, rename the old .dbx file and reimport, also didn't work. I even tried to delete my outlook express mail accounts and read them, also didn't work. I am running Win7. I don't think I have a virus on my computer as my scan didn't return any virus. Thanks.
 
How large is your old backup Inbox.dbx file? If it is small(several KB), then there will be no messages inside it. If it is large, several MB or more), then there will be messages inside it and you can try some Outlook Express mail recovery tools to recover the messages inside it. Can search the Internet. There are a lot of offers. Or can try this, which I usually use. http://www.oemailrecovery.com/outlook-express-recovery.html
But first of all do the following.

On the picture shown is where the mail lives and if you cannot recover it from there, it may be gone. Look also in your Recycle Bin for .bak files, especially Inbox.bak that go there as a result of Outlook Express cleanup.
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/918069
I took this from a Windows 7 machine that is fully up to date including the recent updates and the updates did not bash Outlook Express. So in addition to your own virus scan, scan with Malwarebytes and see if maybe you do have a virus. If no malware, there appears to be some other operating system corruption.
 
Is it over 2GB? Used to get this problem when I worked in support all the time years ago. The company ended up buying Stellar Phoenix Outlook Express Repair. IIRC it's the one that can actually open your inbox file and view your emails, then export for you or it can split it into smaller readable files. Looks like it's currently $99 which isn't that much to pay to recover all your emails if you don't have a backup. I think they also have a trial which will show you what it can recover, then it'll make you pay to perform the recovery/export.

Also, stop using Outlook Express, please.
 
I've got round this before using UnDBX. Export the messages to a an empty folder, then import them back into Outlook by dragging and dropping them in. This will take quite a while if the files are on a harddrive.

If the DBX files are nearly 2GB, it's time to split the folders up and/or delete what you don't need.
 
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