Lost all Outlook Express emails (Inbox, Sent, Deleted)

Flitcher · 6th October 2002

Ok,
My computer today was acting up, it was lagging and stalling a bit. So at first I rebooted it and it was still lagging, so I shut it down. After being off for a couple mins I restarted it and left, I came back about an hour later, logged in (Win 2000) and noticed that some of my applications that were kept open had been lost. For example, I have Apache installed on my computer. When the computer logged in it could not find the ApacheMonitor file which loads at startup. I then opened up Outlook Express and ALL my emails - inbox, outbox, and deleted were GONE. Is there anyway to get them back? I've been told no because I'm on a FAT32 HD. The thing is that my computer did not lockup, it just lagged a bit, I did no force bootdowns. If you need anymore information please let me know. I hope I did not lose all the emails....

I downloaded a recovery software program and it was able to recover around 500 "lost" *.dbx files, I had it recover the most present ones (April 2002, still a while ago) and saved them to my hard drive. I then put the recovered files that were said to be in "good" condition in my outlook express folder. However, outlook express was unable to read the new(recovered) .dbx files I placed. Is there anyway to get the recovered files I found to work? I also found a program called DBXtract, but it was unable to extract the email messages from the recovered *.dbx files. I'm quite despereate so if anyone can help please do.

Daizy · 6th October 2002

Hi Flitcher
Just a guess. The files probably have the attribute of "read only". Right click, choose properties and change the attributes.

If that isn't the problem, rather than use the "Import" feature of Outlook Express, simply manually place the files in the correct folder...thereby replacing the current .dbx files?

Daizy

*edit*
Otherwise:
File-Import-Messages-highlight MS OE6-click import mail from store directory-browse to the .dbx location.

Flitcher · 6th October 2002

Hi,
I've tried all those before, nothing worked. I have a feeling the recovered .dbx files may be corrupt even though they are listed in "good" condition by the recovery software. Is there anyother way, or does this pretty much mean I can't recover my messages.

Victory · 9th October 2002

I have heard that McAfee can delete .dbx files if your e-mail or internet download scan is enabled.

The patch is here: http://www.mcafeeretail.com/naicommo...ad/patches.asp

scroll down the page and the version 6.02 from 06/04/02 the files is called VS060230.exe.

Of course this is only helpful if you're using McAfee but I know it was a nightmare we had for the longest time and when we switched to Norton the problem stopped.

Never did put 2 and 2 together until recently.