Contents of my E-mail folders disappeared.

This is a first for me. I'd been working on my computer and using my e-mail as normal. I left to work on a web page, came back and found my e-mail wasn't displaying the contents of my INBOX nor would it display any messages I'd saved in any of my 21 folders under my INBOX. I some times leave a messages in my INBOX until I can affect it. I tried sending myself an e-mail from another mail account. The INBOX shows that there is a new unread message but will not display it! I rebooted warm and cold! Still no luck.

I could sure use a little X-Mas help. Thanks. SKEET

Windows XP Pro, 1.6 GHz, 512 Ram
Netscape 7.2, McAfee Enterprise 8.0.0
ZoneAlarm

 

Your site redirected me to several places to get answers.
Under:

Lost Mail and/or Profile

Lost Mail & Newsgroups Account Settings "¢â€¢ Profile

Netscape 7.2, and Mozilla 1.7 - 1.7.3
Click on the "Browse" button to the right of the Local directory field, and navigate to the correct path for the mail account which contains your mail. Once you have highlighted the correct mail account folder, click "OK ". The correct path will now be shown in the Local directory field.

MY CORRECT PATH IS ALREADY SHOWN IN THE LOCAL DIRECTORY FIELD!
And the all the folders are listed and contain data.
I'm still at a loss SKEET

 

I think that almost everyone got hit once by this, and you will find posts almost identical to your at this newsgroup. You have to locate your profile , and, within your mail account folder, delete the Inbox.msf file.
Do this with Netscape closed, from Windows Explorer. The .msf problem was very common with earlier Netscape6.x version, but not so much with NS7.1 or 7.2. In case you don't know the .msf file is the header file, and if becomes corrpted, for whatever reason, you will not see the message. The messages are in the Inbox file, i.e. with no extention, and you don't want to mess with it. It should work.

 

Thanks, WESTSIDE, but your suggestion didn't work. I deleted Inbox.msf while Netscape was closed, reloaded Netscape but no luck. I also have 3 other e-mail accounts that are handled by Netscape directly under my main account. I tried the same suggestion on them with no luck.

I've been using Netscape for 9 years and have had few problems and not one like this.

I do have one regularly compacted folder I save e-mails to that has a lot of stuff in it. A problem?
SAVES 25,429KB File
SAVES.msf 63KB MSF File.

As I mentioned before, I can send myself a message from another e-mail account outside Netscape, it is recorded in Netscape by displaying a number by my INBOX. I now have 5 messages that won't display. The same is true with my other 3 e-mail accounts handled by Netscape.

Are there anymore suggestions out there?

 

A lot of people say that they used Netscape for many years. That does not count, because Netscapes from 6 on have been completely rewritten, bringing in problems which did not exist before.
You mention the size of the Inbox. This bothers me. In your first message you also mention, what I would say, 21 subfolders of the Inbox. You should have a Inbox.sbd folder where all the individual folders are located. Do you see such folder on the hard drive? It should have 21 files with no extention, each with a different name, and 21 corresponding .msf files. But the number of files in the Inbox file tells me that you should have hundreds of e-mails in it. Does it make sense? I have about 20 e-mails in the Inbox file, and twice as many stored in subfolders, and, I see a one to two ration in size.
You may have a major corruption of the prefs.js file.
I vwould try to create a new profile, setting up a single account in it, and testing it. Then, if ok, you would have to copy/past the individual account's Inbox and Sent folder.
Is your browser is ok (check the bookmarks), it is a strange problem. I don't know if I even understand what could have happened.
fp

 

Thanks again for your response WESTSIDE.
However, you misunderstood what I wrote. I said .. ".of my 21 folders under my INBOX."
MY 21 folders, along with INBOX, are each separate folders under my main account. Also, my INBOX is normal size and I keep it regularly emptied.
I have a SAVE folder in my account (not a subfolder of INBOX) that contains 25,429 KB of e-mails. (a lot of e-mails!) I don't know if this is a problem itself or has anything to do with my oringinal delima.

Be that as it may, I saved my PROFILES folder, uninstalled Netscape and reinstalled it copying back my saved PROFILES folder. Everything works again!!

Thanks for hanging in there with me! Maybe you know the limit of how much data a folder can hold? Interesting question.

SKEET

 

Skeet,
glad that it worked.
As for the under, I interpreted as part of, while you meant below. Just semantics.
As for the limit, I don't know. Some people have been saving GB, without backup. That's insane. I prefer to break down the folder some that when I open it, I don't have to scroll. It is much more manageable, that way.