Member Avatar for owenwoods

None of the archive email folders (PST) open to an account. ALL will not open. The lastest reached about 20 GB on Friday, then all became inaccessible even though they are individual pst files. I just see a tree list of folders and can not open the emails. Scanpst might chop away valuable mail. Any clue’s why this has happened? Or how I can retrieve the archives?

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Short summary and safe next steps (builds on description and the pointers from and ).

Outlook 2003/2007 use Unicode .pst files with a default MaxLargeFileSize of about 20,480 MB (20 GB). When a .pst reaches that limit or the file’s internal structures are damaged, Outlook can stop letting you open items even though the file still exists. (support.microsoft.com)

Practical recovery plan (do these in order and always work on copies):

  1. Make full byte-for-byte copies of every archive .pst to at least one separate drive — do not work on the originals.
  2. If the .pst lives on a network share or external USB, copy it to the local machine first.
  3. Try attaching the copied .pst to a fresh Outlook profile (File > Open/Account Settings > Data Files / Open Outlook Data File) so you can inspect without importing. (learn.microsoft.com)
  4. If Outlook won’t open the copy, run the Inbox Repair tool (ScanPST.exe) on the copy. Let it create its backup and review the log. ScanPST repairs low-level structures but can remove blocks that are unreadable, so expect some items may be lost; that is why working on a copy is essential. (learn.microsoft.com)

If ScanPST can’t fully recover:

  • Try opening the copied .pst with a newer Outlook (Outlook 2010+ uses a much larger default limit, and MaxLargeFileSize can be changed in the registry — but changing registry values has risks and should be a last resort). (support.microsoft.com)
  • If that still fails, consider specialist commercial PST-repair tools or a data-recovery service; salvage success varies and professional services are often the safest route for very large or heavily corrupted files.

Quick checklist: make backups first, avoid writing to the originals, run ScanPST only on copies, check the ScanPST log, and escalate to a newer Outlook or professional recovery if needed. For large/corrupted archives the Inbox Repair tool may need multiple passes or may be unable to recover everything. (learn.microsoft.com)

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Member Avatar for avilsben

while the limit for a pst file in Outlook is no longer 2GB I believe that the size of your file is the problem. Either the file size alone or the file size in combination with the resources of your computer. 20GB is the maximum.
From

Member Avatar for jwenting

yup, your mail archive has exceeded the maximum size.
You MIGHT be able to open it with a later version of Outlook or Exchange.

A quick Google search for "recover outlook archive" yielded several tools that might help (mind, I've not tried any of them).

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