Windose XP

Crosley.In.AZ · January 29, 2005, 11:13:33 PM

I upgraded this computer to Windows XP home edition from ME.

I use the basic Outlook express for email...... after the upgrade to XP , ALL of my email folders are empty! Address book is intact

Did the XP up grade move the email messages somewhere or dump them??

Nothing in the install book on email folders getting dumped clean.

rooster · January 29, 2005, 11:33:58 PM

Cant answer for sure but I think when ever you do a windows upgrade it make a backup file of the old one witch has the outlook files in it! be sure you dont delete it! Stll 98ing it here! Good luck.

58Apache · January 29, 2005, 11:34:54 PM

Crosley, that does sound a little weird. Not what I'd expect.

Do a search on your hard drive for . pst

The file that contains your e-mail should still be there. You may have to "import it". If you find the file, I think it should be outlook.pst When you find it, on the Outlook program click on FILE on the upper left, then "import and export" and import that file.

Steve

40 · January 29, 2005, 11:38:49 PM

My wife upgraded from AOL 8.0 to 9.0 and it did the exact same thing...all of my e-mail folders were dumped into cyberspace...after 3 hrs with a tech from AOL....I got...."Sorry,they're lost".That Sucks!!!

58 Yeoman · January 29, 2005, 11:41:42 PM

On my puter, they are .dbx files. 58 Apache is right about having to import them. I'm running Win2k.

Crosley.In.AZ · January 30, 2005, 12:07:08 AM

thanks guys,

I find nothing with the search feature or import feature using various file names and extensions. The messages seem to be gone.

There was some items I had not copied down or put on a CD.

I am not happy at this point

Fat Cat · January 30, 2005, 12:36:08 AM

Quote from: "Crosley"thanks guys,

I find nothing with the search feature or import feature using various file names and extensions. The messages seem to be gone.

There was some items I had not copied down or put on a CD.

I am not happy at this point

I found this article on the Microsoft Knowledge Base
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;Q313055

I found some more here http://www.softwaretipsandtricks.com/forum/showthread.php?t=9390

58Apache · January 30, 2005, 12:54:32 AM

Crosley, don't give up on this. I highly doubt it would have deleted them. Check in your recycle bin on your desktop just in case, but my money is they are still on your hard drive.

Another option is to do an advanced search, and have it search for all files over 1 meg in size. Your e-mail file would be one of the larger files on your hard drive. It may be named something different, or there may be a backup file you can import. You'll be looking for anything with .pst or anything that says outlook.

Steve

Fat Cat · January 30, 2005, 01:51:29 AM

Quote from: "58Apache"Crosley, don't give up on this. I highly doubt it would have deleted them. Check in your recycle bin on your desktop just in case, but my money is they are still on your hard drive.

Another option is to do an advanced search, and have it search for all files over 1 meg in size. Your e-mail file would be one of the larger files on your hard drive. It may be named something different, or there may be a backup file you can import. You'll be looking for anything with .pst or anything that says outlook.

Steve

According to microsoft they will be something like file.dbx for the mail folders and address.wab for the address book.

Dave · January 30, 2005, 07:59:44 AM

Quote from: "Crosley"I upgraded this computer to Windows XP home edition from ME.

I use the basic Outlook express for email...... after the upgrade to XP , ALL of my email folders are empty! Address book is intact

Did the XP up grade move the email messages somewhere or dump them??

Nothing in the install book on email folders getting dumped clean.

Same thing happened here with xp pro... Wasnt a big deal just kinda sucks .
Other than that I like xp i think
Dave

kb426 · January 30, 2005, 10:19:33 AM

Each one of the mail folders has a.dbx folder, inbox, sent, deleted items. Those folders hide. It's been too long since I had 98 to help you with this much, but I remember an import fuction on xp when I upgraded at my office. I remember that this was in the outlook express menu bar but my memory is so poor anymore that it may have been part of the original setup on xp. All these files will be hidden even deeper in structure in xp because it has the basics of 2000's network structure. I would try a search from the administrators prompt for inbox.dbx and see what you find. If you're not logged on with admin privledges you won't be able to see anything but your own profile.

Crosley.In.AZ · January 30, 2005, 10:30:55 AM

Quote from: "Fat Cat"
Quote from: "Crosley"thanks guys,

I find nothing with the search feature or import feature using various file names and extensions. The messages seem to be gone.

There was some items I had not copied down or put on a CD.

I am not happy at this point

I found this article on the Microsoft Knowledge Base
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;Q313055

I found some more here http://www.softwaretipsandtricks.com/forum/showthread.php?t=9390

Ok....... I read the info on the first link fatcat posted.

It seems if you follow the instructions on searching for "hidden files & folders" with *.dbx the email was located! I was not using the advanced search feature.

Importing the files I needed to get the correct version of Outlook so the system would accept it, then boom it coppied all files over.

Fatcat , thanks for saving some of my hair from being pulled out.... although that is a quick job with the little hair I have remaining.

thanks for all the suggestions guys. I figured the files were moved , but the 'hidden file' crap I never thought of.

I am gonna stick this XP windows CD into my laptop and see what explodes

kb426 · January 30, 2005, 11:37:52 AM

Congratulations! You're one step closer to becoming a Geek.

58Apache · January 30, 2005, 11:53:19 AM

Hmmm looks like they changed from .pst to .dbx in between version upgrade of Outlook somewhere.

I switched away from Outlook a while back partly because of security concerns. That's one of the most frequently attacked programs for viruses. I use the default program from Earthlink now. I also went to Firefox for a web browser for teh same reason. It really cut down on the spyware, popups, etc.

Steve

40 · January 30, 2005, 02:37:40 PM

I poked around using the info provided above but there were no files to be found.I assume since they were probably saved somewhere within the AOL program that it's an entirely differant situation?Any Ideas???I'm about as usefull sitting in front of this damned thing as I would be trying to fly the space shuttle