Outlook 2007 has stopped working and hangs on opening

[Pep]

I have been happily using Outlook 2007 on Win XP for ages, then suddenly
yesterday it no longer opens.

Well it tries to open, and it opens up to a point, I can see my mail, but
nothing in the preview pane, and nothing (including Outlook itself) is
clickable - the mouse actually disappears when I scroll over it. I have tried
opening with numerous switches, including the one that disables the preview
pane, but all still lead to the same thing.

I have used scanpst to repair my pst file, Outlook seems to be opening it
fine, I can see my folders on the left, and how many emails I have etc - I
just can't access anything in Outlook!

I have even repaired Outlook from the Office CD, it just won't open! Well
not enough so as I can use it!

When it opens, it shows me yesterdays emails listed in the inbox, but the
preview pane is blank - I can see all the folders etc but when I move my
mouse over Outlook, it disappears and therefore nothing is selectable. It
does not respond to keystrokes either, I tried ALT-F for File menu etc - no
effect.

I have tried using ALT-TAB to definately select Outlook in Windows, but
still the mouse disappears (almost seems like the mouse disappears behind it)

It does nothing from that point on. I have tried leaving it a few mins to
let it connect and get mail from my pop servers, but it does nothing. Just
sits there - no new mail, no nothing, it's not even going through the motions.

 

[K. Orland]

Unhide all your hidden files and folders in Windows Explorer. Leave Outlook
closed. Search for and rename outcmd.dat. Open Outlook, see if that helps. If
not, open Outook with the /cleanviews switch:

Start > Run > outlook.exe /cleanviews

Let me know if either of those work for you. If not, there are more options.

 

[Pep]

Hiya

OK, tried both of those but no joy - still doing the same.

I have been trying to think what I did last - and that was I flagged an
email for follow-up. Now that I notice it, when I open Outlook, it draws the
to-do list and flags at the bottom right, and then they disappear, leaving
some greyed out empty flags, that almost flicker as if there's some kind of
bug with that part ?!

Thanks for helping

 

[K. Orland]

Have you run scanpst.exe against your PST file to check for any errors?

 

[Pep]

Yes, I did that, it repaired it. I also did archive.pst too. Outlook seems to
be opening it ok, I can see my folders on the left and my unopened emails in
them, and above the preview pane..