OUTLOOK files missing

[surzycki]

HI,

My computer crashed and since then my personal outlook files (folder and old emails) have disappeared. How can (if I can) recover these files? Can I undelete? I have NT 4.0 with NTFS.
Any help, info, pointing in the right direction would be much appreciated.

THanks

Stefan

 

[MarcLodge]

Stefan,
When you say personal files, do you mean the .PST files? And when you say they have disappeared, do you mean they are no longer on your hard drive or do you mean that you can no longer access them from Outlook?
(sorry for so many questions!)
Marc

 

[surzycki]

Marc,

Thanks for the reply, when I try and open outlook, it says that the personal address book and folders cannot be found (I am not too familiar with outlook so I am not sure if it is all located in the pst or not) I had a virus on my machine that crashed the machine and I think erased these files. I fixed the machine but the files have been deleted (so I think I can undelete them if I only know where and what files to undelete). I am not certain that the files have been deleted though because I don't know what I am looking for.

Stefan

 

[meintsi]

Try a search for the .pst files and then point Outlook towards them when you get your error message saying they can't be found.

If you using Outlook express, there are several files in .dbx format.

Good Luck.... *Remember.......
If you don't use your head,
your going to have to use your feet.

 

[MarcLodge]

Hi Stefan,
In Outlook, your Personal Address book file is usually called Outlook.pab and any folders are ????.pst files. Have a look in the delete bucket and see if there's anything in there.
Marc

 

[alanmcconachie]

It's been a few weeks since this was posted so you've probably either found your files or given up by now.

But I had a very similar thing happen to me yesterday. A user had lost all his outlook PST files. Even a search of the hard disk couldn't find them. But what I did find was some Recovered file fragments in a folder called Found.000.

After a little inspection of the file in notepad I realaised I'd found my lost PST files. Luckily I was able to rename .chk file to pst and outlook managed to open them.

Never found out why this happened and unfortunatlely more folders started going this way shortly after so a backup and rebuild was required in the end but at least I managed to save over a years worth of email.