Office 2003 SP3 - reminders stop working after installation of SP3

[p_2v71]

After installinig Office 2003 SP3 my Outlook reminders stopped working on the
local client. I am still getting reminders on my blackberry but the machine
that I installed SP3 on no longer gives any Task reminder notifications.

I have tried the following options to fix the problem but none worked:

Close Outlook
Click the Start button and select Run
Enter this including the quotes
"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\OFFICE11\Outlook.exe" /cleanfreebusy
Close Outlook and do the same for the switch below.
"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\OFFICE11\Outlook.exe" /cleanschedplus
Close Outlook and do the same for the switch below.
"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\OFFICE11\Outlook.exe" /resetfolders

Safe Mode didn't fix the issue either.

Any assistance would be appreciated

 

[Brian Tillman]

After installinig Office 2003 SP3 my Outlook reminders stopped
working on the local client. I am still getting reminders on my
blackberry but the machine that I installed SP3 on no longer gives
any Task reminder notifications.

I have tried the following options to fix the problem but none worked:

Did you try uninstalling SP3?

 

[RDFTS]

Brian being a MVP for Outlook, are you suggesting that in general we do not
deploy Office 2003 SP3?

Thanks,
Rick

 

[Brian Tillman]

Brian being a MVP for Outlook, are you suggesting that in general we
do not deploy Office 2003 SP3?

At home? No. In a production environment in a place of business? Prudence
dictates that you install it on a test bed system that's similar to the
production systems, but on which there's nothing to lose and test it
extensively there before deplying it generally.

 

[RDFTS]

In several of your post, you are suggesting to uninstall SP3 as the
solution. This leads me to believe that in general you are suggesting that
perhaps we shouldn't deploy SP3 until some of the bugs are worked out.
Sometimes you can't think of every possible test to do in a test bed
scenario. My biggest issue that I have seen so far is the Autocorrect stops
working in Outlook even though everything is configured and worked just fine
prior to SP3.

Any by the way, you cannot uninstall SP3. You have to completely uninstall
Office 2003 and reinstall, then installed SP2 and then finally update all
the Office updates except for SP3 to get back to where you were. A home
users, perhaps but a business with 100+ computers, not a good way to do it.

So uninstalling SP3 isn't the best option and not a simple solution.

Rick

 

[Brian Tillman]

In several of your post, you are suggesting to uninstall SP3 as the
solution. This leads me to believe that in general you are suggesting
that perhaps we shouldn't deploy SP3 until some of the bugs are
worked out. Sometimes you can't think of every possible test to do in
a test bed scenario. My biggest issue that I have seen so far is the
Autocorrect stops working in Outlook even though everything is
configured and worked just fine prior to SP3.

We use "guinea pigs" as well as test beds. Certain members of the IT staff
get updates before others and they use it for a while before the general
employee gets the roll-out.

Any by the way, you cannot uninstall SP3. You have to completely uninstall
Office 2003 and reinstall, then installed SP2 and then finally update all
the Office updates except for SP3 to get back to where you were. A home
users, perhaps but a business with 100+ computers, not a good way to do
it.

This is also why we have standard PC images available. If something proves
ill-behaved, we simply reimage the PC to the most recent working OS and
application suite. No reinstallation of anything, just a restore of the
user-specific data.

 

[RDFTS]

I agree with you but in our busy lifes at work, this is easier said than
done.
I am not sure if reminders are an issue with SP3 but MS has identified that
there is the autocorrect bug.

 

[Brian Tillman]

I agree with you but in our busy lifes at work, this is easier said
than done.

Our life is quite busy, too, but if we didn't take this approach, it would
be even busier. It's much easier to address a problem before it's pushed to
all the PCs.

 

[RDFTS]

My point is it is almost impossible even in a lab or test environment to try
every possible scenario to test compatibility. If testing stuff was so easy,
then software wouldn't have any bugs because quality control would find it
so it could be fixed. Just not going to happen. I agree test before deploy
but sometimes you can't think of everything to test.

RDFTS