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Problems Opening Email in OE6

Discussion in 'Microsoft Mail (Outlook / OE / Windows Mail)' started by alistair, 2008/05/07.

  1. 2008/05/07
    alistair

    alistair Well-Known Member Thread Starter

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    I turn my notebook off each night. When I have restarted each morning, I start Outlook Express and go straight to the Inbox. Everything looks normal, but when I double click on an email, I just get the hourglass, and nothing happens, no matter how long I wait. If I then use CTRL-ALT-DELETE to shut OE down and then restart OE, the inbox displays normally and shows as having been read the email I previously tried to read but could not. If I then double click the email, it opens perfectly, and all will be OK all day. The problem then reappears the following morning.

    I don't know if it means anything but when CTRL-ALT-DEL is closing OE, the CPU usage climbs rapidly up to 100% just before OE closes.

    Also, if I use OE's "Find" function to search for an email, and then double click on an email of interest that shows in the search results box, I often get the message "Message could not be displayed.
    Outlook Express encountered an unexpected problem while displaying this message. Check your computer for low memory or low disk space and try again. "

    If I then go to the normal folder in which that email is stored, it will open perfectly - it's only opening from the search results that is a problem. If I restart OE, the emails from the first few searches will open OK, and then I'll start getting that message. Any suggestions?

    I don't know if it contributes to either problem, but my .dbx folders are quite large and would total a few GB, divided up into a number of working folders.

    My notebook is a Toshiba Tecra S2 with 60GB drive (12GB spare) and 1GB of RAM.

    Any suggestions?

    Thanks.
     
    alistair,
    #1
  2. 2008/05/07
    PeteC

    PeteC SuperGeek Staff

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    alistair

    Could be any number of reasons, but likely candidates are .dbx corruption, oversize folders, dll problems.

    As a start create a new folder - InboxOld and drag all the emails from Inbox into it. Close OE and search for *.dbx - search hidden files and folders and delete Inbox.dbx. Restart OE - Inbox will be recreated. Drag the emails from InboxOld to Inbox and delete InboxOld - test.

    If that does not resolve the problem ....

    Reregister OE and it's associated library files as outlined in An Outlook Express basic repair kit - note that the command regsvr32 msjava.dll will probably fail as you are unlikely to have msjava.

    and if that fails ....

    The maximum limit for a folder in OE is 2 Gb, but OE starts to play funny long before then.

    Possible solution here - split the larger .dbx folders into two or more smaller ones. Main folders I think rather than sub folders. So if you have a large folder named, say, xxxxx make a new folder xxxxx1, highlight a selection of emails in xxxxx and drag to xxxxx1.
     
    PeteC,
    #2


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  4. 2008/05/21
    alistair

    alistair Well-Known Member Thread Starter

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    Thanks Pete. Tried all those suggestions. It seemed to improve slightly for a while, then went back to its old habits.

    Any other suggestions gratefully received!
     
    alistair,
    #3
  5. 2008/05/22
    PeteC

    PeteC SuperGeek Staff

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    Which version of IE are you using - 6 or 7? OE is integrated into IE.
     
    PeteC,
    #4
  6. 2008/05/22
    alistair

    alistair Well-Known Member Thread Starter

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    I have IE 7. It occasionally locks up also, but it's not as much trouble as OE.
     
    alistair,
    #5
  7. 2008/05/23
    PeteC

    PeteC SuperGeek Staff

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    The only suggestion I have is a reinstall of IE 6 as outlined in Method 2 here, unless your Toshiba came with a full XP installation CD - not a Recovery CD which I rather doubt - in which case Method 1 may work.

    http://www.theeldergeek.com/repair_reinstall_ie_and_oe_6.htm
    First you will need to uninstall IE 7 through Add/Remove Programs to roll back to 6. Worthwhile testing OE at this stage.

    As always a backup of all essential data is essential before embarking on 'major surgery' :)
     
    PeteC,
    #6

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