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- 24 Feb 2004
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OK, my Office 07 Beta 2 expired so I uninstalled it and reverted to 03. Before uninstalling, I tried to sort out the mess that my .pst files are in due to my various lapsed email accounts, uninstallations and reinstallations of various versions of Outlook resulting in multiple .pst files (multiple calendars and contact files) and me not being sure which one the most recent one is. (I could find out from within outlook which one it was simply by adding a new contact to my phone and synchronising it with Outlook, but, due to their all being called "Personal Folders" inside Outlook, I couldn't find out which .pst file the most recent copy of my personal folders corresponded to!)
What I do then is copy all the .pst files in \Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook to another location and delete them from that directory. I then uninstall Outlook 07 and reinstall 03. Initially, I couldn't get 03 working because I was getting the stupid "Cannot start Microsoft Outlook MAPI32.DLL is corrupt or wrong version" error message. A little googling later and I was able to find a workaround on this page (second post by ostfiles, where he says "Issue solved: The error message for "MAPI32.DLL" is wrong and the actual file it is looking for is MSMAPI32.DLL. It's located at: C:\Program Files\Common Files\System\MSMAPI\1033 (or you can do a file find if it might be in a different directory on your system).")
FINALLY, I reinstall Outlook 03 and it launches without an error message, but, on its first run, I'm surprised to see "Migrating user settings", as well as error messages and dialogue boxes asking for specific .pst files that I had deleted - and this on a fresh install!! These are NOT default outlook files, but files which I had accidentally imported into outlook previously when I was trying to import my contacts from 03 into the 07 beta, and include filenames like "outlook1.pst" and "backupofwebmail.pst" (which is on another partition!), which Outlook should not have even KNOWN the names of, much less look for them on its first launch!
Perplexed, I ignore all the dialogues and hit cancel on every browse window, and let it launch itself and create a new, blank outlook.pst file. However, I find that it has also created new, blank versions of all those other .pst files associated with my old, defunct email accounts! I try to delete all those new files,a nd launch it again to be greeted by the message "Server unavailable" and Outlook refusing to open. I then capitulate and copy all those old hundreds of MB of .pst files back into the \Outlook directory, and launch again. However, I find that, bizzarely, even though all the old files that I had been using earlier today have been reinstated, I don't have the latest copy of my Contacts, Tasks or Calendar files! This in itself isn't a big deal because I can re-synchronise from my mobile, but I now have no idea which pst file Outlook 07 had been using to store the most recent copy!
I'm now livid, so I furiously delete everything again, re-launch Outlook, click cancel through its hundreds of dialogues asking me to browse to the old .pst files, and enter the Email Accounts menu in Tools. I delete all my old email accounts, thinking this will stop it looking for the old .pst files. I close Outlook and relaunch, but it's still looking for them. I launch the Data File Management thing from the File menu and see that the entries for the old .pst files associated with the old email accounts are STILL there, despite my having deleted both the .pst files themselves from the /Outlook directory AND the email accounts from within Outlook!
I also find I still have 2 different "Personal Folders" in that list, and I can't delete either of them because they're the default mail delivery directories - even though there's no actual email accounts associated with them! I find a way to get past this by creating 2 new data files in the email accounts menu and setting them as the defaults, which removes the default status from the old ones. However, I still can't delete all the old email accounts, and I've got an old version of my Hotmail folders which cannot be opened, deleted, or otherwise touched, even though the .pst file doesn't actually exist, and the account doesn't appear in the list of email accounts accessible from the Tools menu!
I then started importing my old .pst files one by one, until I eventually found the most recent one. However, I can't seem to set it up to be the default one from which Outlook reads my Calendar and Tasks unless I play a strange game of musical chairs with the .pst files. For some reason, Outlook seems to always have 2 .pst files set up as "default" (even though no email accounts are associated with them). I was only able to delete the 2 old "personal folders" by creating two new blank "dummy" .pst files and setting them up as the default delivery directories (first one, then the other). This took the default status off the old ones and I was able to delete them. By recovering my old .pst file, it became the third .pst file in the list, with the first two listed as default. By assigning the recovered one as the default I took away default status from one of the dummies, and was able to delete it. However, the "top-of-the-list" default one, Outlook's "home" folder, was still the second dummy file. To get my own .pst file to become the "home folder", I had to create a new dummy folder and set it up to be the default. This took away default status from the old dummy, bumping my own .pst file up to the top of the list. Now my own file is the "home folder", but I still have the other dummy, and I can't get rid of it because Outlook wants me to have 2 default folders!!!
I want to start recreating my email accounts and adding new contacts, but I don't know if Outlook will add them to the "real" .pst file or to the dummy I created to get rid of the other one! This means that, next time around, I'll have to muck about with discovering which of my .pst files is the most up-to-date one again, and I don't want that: I want to only have one, but I can't seem to get rid of the second one!
I am utterly baffled and frustrated, and for the first time in my life I can't figure out the logic behind the way this application stores its data! I need advice, and I need someone to basically explain to me how to sort out this mess, preferably without losing my old data, in kindergartenspeak, because I've basically thrown my hands in the air at this point! I want to have ONE .pst file where all my email accounts, Tasks, Contacts, Calendar, Sex Toys and Accounting Frauds are all stored in, so that next time I have to reinstall either Windows or just Office I can just copy it over to the new Application Data folder for Outlook and have a hassle-free, brainless migration!
PLEASE HELP!!!
What I do then is copy all the .pst files in \Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook to another location and delete them from that directory. I then uninstall Outlook 07 and reinstall 03. Initially, I couldn't get 03 working because I was getting the stupid "Cannot start Microsoft Outlook MAPI32.DLL is corrupt or wrong version" error message. A little googling later and I was able to find a workaround on this page (second post by ostfiles, where he says "Issue solved: The error message for "MAPI32.DLL" is wrong and the actual file it is looking for is MSMAPI32.DLL. It's located at: C:\Program Files\Common Files\System\MSMAPI\1033 (or you can do a file find if it might be in a different directory on your system).")
FINALLY, I reinstall Outlook 03 and it launches without an error message, but, on its first run, I'm surprised to see "Migrating user settings", as well as error messages and dialogue boxes asking for specific .pst files that I had deleted - and this on a fresh install!! These are NOT default outlook files, but files which I had accidentally imported into outlook previously when I was trying to import my contacts from 03 into the 07 beta, and include filenames like "outlook1.pst" and "backupofwebmail.pst" (which is on another partition!), which Outlook should not have even KNOWN the names of, much less look for them on its first launch!
Perplexed, I ignore all the dialogues and hit cancel on every browse window, and let it launch itself and create a new, blank outlook.pst file. However, I find that it has also created new, blank versions of all those other .pst files associated with my old, defunct email accounts! I try to delete all those new files,a nd launch it again to be greeted by the message "Server unavailable" and Outlook refusing to open. I then capitulate and copy all those old hundreds of MB of .pst files back into the \Outlook directory, and launch again. However, I find that, bizzarely, even though all the old files that I had been using earlier today have been reinstated, I don't have the latest copy of my Contacts, Tasks or Calendar files! This in itself isn't a big deal because I can re-synchronise from my mobile, but I now have no idea which pst file Outlook 07 had been using to store the most recent copy!
I'm now livid, so I furiously delete everything again, re-launch Outlook, click cancel through its hundreds of dialogues asking me to browse to the old .pst files, and enter the Email Accounts menu in Tools. I delete all my old email accounts, thinking this will stop it looking for the old .pst files. I close Outlook and relaunch, but it's still looking for them. I launch the Data File Management thing from the File menu and see that the entries for the old .pst files associated with the old email accounts are STILL there, despite my having deleted both the .pst files themselves from the /Outlook directory AND the email accounts from within Outlook!
I also find I still have 2 different "Personal Folders" in that list, and I can't delete either of them because they're the default mail delivery directories - even though there's no actual email accounts associated with them! I find a way to get past this by creating 2 new data files in the email accounts menu and setting them as the defaults, which removes the default status from the old ones. However, I still can't delete all the old email accounts, and I've got an old version of my Hotmail folders which cannot be opened, deleted, or otherwise touched, even though the .pst file doesn't actually exist, and the account doesn't appear in the list of email accounts accessible from the Tools menu!
I then started importing my old .pst files one by one, until I eventually found the most recent one. However, I can't seem to set it up to be the default one from which Outlook reads my Calendar and Tasks unless I play a strange game of musical chairs with the .pst files. For some reason, Outlook seems to always have 2 .pst files set up as "default" (even though no email accounts are associated with them). I was only able to delete the 2 old "personal folders" by creating two new blank "dummy" .pst files and setting them up as the default delivery directories (first one, then the other). This took the default status off the old ones and I was able to delete them. By recovering my old .pst file, it became the third .pst file in the list, with the first two listed as default. By assigning the recovered one as the default I took away default status from one of the dummies, and was able to delete it. However, the "top-of-the-list" default one, Outlook's "home" folder, was still the second dummy file. To get my own .pst file to become the "home folder", I had to create a new dummy folder and set it up to be the default. This took away default status from the old dummy, bumping my own .pst file up to the top of the list. Now my own file is the "home folder", but I still have the other dummy, and I can't get rid of it because Outlook wants me to have 2 default folders!!!
I want to start recreating my email accounts and adding new contacts, but I don't know if Outlook will add them to the "real" .pst file or to the dummy I created to get rid of the other one! This means that, next time around, I'll have to muck about with discovering which of my .pst files is the most up-to-date one again, and I don't want that: I want to only have one, but I can't seem to get rid of the second one!
I am utterly baffled and frustrated, and for the first time in my life I can't figure out the logic behind the way this application stores its data! I need advice, and I need someone to basically explain to me how to sort out this mess, preferably without losing my old data, in kindergartenspeak, because I've basically thrown my hands in the air at this point! I want to have ONE .pst file where all my email accounts, Tasks, Contacts, Calendar, Sex Toys and Accounting Frauds are all stored in, so that next time I have to reinstall either Windows or just Office I can just copy it over to the new Application Data folder for Outlook and have a hassle-free, brainless migration!
PLEASE HELP!!!
