Cleaning up my computer from some virus "invasions" seems to have messed up my operating copy of Microsoft Office Outlook.
[My OS is xp Pro, sp2, Office Pro 2003 enterprise edition with Hebrew multilanguage content]
The program no longer receives nor sends emails and, though I can easily access saved mails and link from then with no problem, I can't erase them.
When I attempt to erase a file I get an error message saying that errors have been detected in the file c:\Documents and Settings\....\Outlook\Outlook1.pst.
I'm advised to exit all mail programs and run the program Scanpst.exe--which I've done several times, to no avail.
Having had no choice, I've started using Outlook express (which I don't like and am not used to manipulating). It has no trouble receiving files but cannot send, access my other saved emails (from Outlook) nor can it access my address book.
I have asuspicion that somehow my system has misplaced my files, but when searching for them they aren't found and, to be quite honest, if I were to find them, I don't know where I would have to place them.
Any advice will be more than welcome.
Thanks in advance for reading this far.

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what I would do is
1. try to save your important emails somewhere else (export to a different PST file if possible, or just simply copy-paste the content in the worst case)
2. start - control panel - mail - data files
remove the existing files and start outlook - it should create a clean new PST, into which you can import the backed up emails. if that doesn't help restore outlook to operational mode - reinstall it, having previously erased ALL the pst files from your system (C:\Documents and Settings\username\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook)

and bruchim habaim le DaniWeb

Todah la"brachot
I'll see what I can do and report back.

In the outlook file I found 3 collections of files:
Archive Folders C:\Documents....
Personal Folders C:\ " .... (With a note--Location for transfer)
Personal Folders C:\Documents .........
The first two folders have 6 sub-folders, each, while the third has a whole collection of Office 11 files.
I copied the first two folders (Archive and Personal) to a stick memory.
Before I go ahead and erase them, I want to check with you if this is what I am supposed to have found.

all pst, no ost files, right?

anyhow, the pst is corrupted, so if you back it up, it will be corrupted as you restore, so what you need to do is try to extract the actual emails elsewhere and back those up.

I licked the problem! For any of you who might have encountered the same problem, I'll try to reconstruct what I did--It took a lot of "messing around" till I managed to do it and, therefore, I might have done something that I'm not reporting that helped, but just in case you're interested.... Here goes.
1. I reset my computer to an earlier date. That made some changes but didn't cure the problem.
2 I kept getting messages to run the program Scanpst.exe after closing all email programs. THIS was what did the trick in the end, but it was very difficult to get it to work.
3. Using search, I found the address of my email files--it should be something like:
C:\Documents and Settings\<your user name>\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook. Opening the folder, I marked and copied (cntrl c) the address into my memory.
Then, using search, I found and opened the Scanpst.exe file.
It asked for the folder to repair--with control V I wrote in the address AND THEN, BEFORE ACTIVATING THE PROGRAM, ADDED AT THE END OF THE ADDRESS:\Outlok1.pst.
Activating the program quickly brought my files back and the whole story to a happy ending.
I don't know how many hours I spent till I managed to figure this out (trial and error) , but the main point is that, as far as I am concerned, the string has ended.
Special Thanks to you DimaYasny. Even though I didn't use your solution (I was afraid to lose something) you gave me the necesssary encouragement.

well, if you posted the error output from the scanpst program, we could have immediately seen that it just lacks the path to the files in question :)

and as for the files themselves - I've given you the path in post #2

And I sincerely thank you--you set me on the right path and I learned a lot in the process.
Mamash Todah Rabba!

bevakasha :) nice to meet hebrew speakers on an english forum, even though hebrew isn't my forst language :)

You can try the application Advanced Outlook Repair .
Hope this can help.

Thanks for your advice but the problem has long since been solved. However, if I recall correctly, I used the repair facility of the Microsoft Office disk to no avail. But just for the sake of curiosity, I will give a look at the URL you supplied.
Thanks again for your good intentions--that's what makes Daniweb such a special site--good people with good ideas and good intentions get together.

the guy is simply a spammer, don't mind him

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