Outlook 2003 is deleting my Archived Messages

[Kenny]

I have been auto archiving my Outlook data for at least 3 years now. I found
my Outlook 2003 is deleting my Archived Messages (archive.pst) if it is
longer than 2 years or so. In my AutoArchive settings, I have Delete Expired
Items unchecked, Permanently Delete Old Items unchecked and Clean Out Old
Item Older Than 12 Months. My Outlook.pst is 1.4 GB and my Archive.pst is 1.2
GB. I'm not sure if the big file size is causing the problem. Why does
Outlook delete my archived messages while I specified not to?

 

[Brian Tillman]

I have been auto archiving my Outlook data for at least 3 years now.
I found my Outlook 2003 is deleting my Archived Messages
(archive.pst) if it is longer than 2 years or so.

While that may be how you're interpreting what you see, Outlook does NOT
automatically delete messages from archives. What are your EXACT symptoms?
Also, are your PSTs ANSI (OL 97-2002) or Unicode (OL 2003) format? If
you've been archiving for "at least 3 years", it may be the former and you
could start seeing issues with PSTs as large as you decribe. While ANSI
PSTs often work reliably up to about 1.8 GB, I've seen them start to act
flakey when they're about 1.25 GB.

 

[Kenny]

I guess my archive.pst is Unicode (OL 2003) format since I'm using Outlook
2003. I don't have any "EXACT symptoms". I am just puzzled why my archived
emails were deleted.

If size is causing trouble, what is the best way to take care of it? I need
to keep at least 3 years of data and reference to them.

 

[Brian Tillman]

I guess my archive.pst is Unicode (OL 2003) format since I'm using
Outlook 2003.

Don't guess. Look. If the archive PST is in your Folders List, then
right-click its root, choose Properties, click Advanced and examine the
Fornat field. If it says "Personal Folders File", it's Unicode and
shouldn't have any size issues. If it says "Personal Folders File
(97-2002)", then it's ANSI and you should probably start a new archive PST
by closing the archive in Outlook (right-click>Close), closing Outlook,
renaming the archive PST to something else (like "Data prior to
12-09-2005.pst" or whatever), and restarting Outlook. It will create a new
archive PST when autoarchive runs again. You can then add it and the old
archive PSt back into the Folder List with File>Open>Outlook Data File.

 

[Kenny]

I went to File>Data File Management>Archive Folders>Settings, the format is
"Personal Folders File". If size is not an issue, why are my older archived
emails disappeared in the archive folders? They don't disappear in the
Personal Folders.