PST - Outlook 2003 can't read valid Outlook XP PST files

[dotBATman]

Hi,

I have several PST's that have never grown over 150MB of size, they were
created in Outlook XP - and still work when I open them in Outlook XP on
another machine.

I upgraded to Office 2003 SP2 with MSPST32.DLL (version 11.0.6566.0), and I
now get the list of folders inside the PST OK, but when I click a folder with
items in it I get "the folder has reached is maximum size". And I'm adviced
to delete / cleanup items (but I can't see any!).

Again, the files are <200MB and when I copy the same file over to a PC with
Outlook XP I can read the file just fine. And if I run SCANPST on the
Outlook XP machine (ScanPST.exe v5.5.2174.0) this validates the file - no
issues found.

However, SCANPST.EXE on the Outlook 2003 machine (v11.0.6565.0) with
SCNPST32.DLL (v11.0.6555.0) provides an error message in step 7 or 8, "13
folders, 4001 items - errors where found".

Details: "Internal errors were found in this file. They must be repaired for
this file to work correctly."

Repair fails (immediately), all I get is "repair failed, some changes may
have been made" which is a bit worrisome. But the file still works on
Outlook XP - and I did back it up first..

The ScanPST error log is listed below, my thought is that "missing required
column" could indicate a translation problem??? I have 2 views in my PST:
One for "Received Items" = Importance, Icon, Flag status, Attachment, FROM,
Subject, Size, Received. One for "Sent Items" = Importance, Icon, Flag
status, Attachment, TO, Subject, Size, Received.

Thanks and regards,
dotBATman.

Attachment: ScanPST log from Outlook 2003 machine

Microsoft (R) Inbox Repair Tool
Copyright (C) Microsoft Corp 1995-1996. All rights reserved.

**Beginning NDB recovery

**Attempting to open database

**Attempting to validate header

**Attempting to validate AMap

**Attempting to validate BBT

**Attempting to validate NBT

**Attempting to validate BBT refcounts

**Attempting to validate header NID high-water marks

**Beginning PST/OST recovery

**Attempting to recover all top-level objects

!!TC (nid=60E) missing required column (10970003)

**Attempting to walk all folders

!!TC (nid=12E) missing required column (10970003)

!!TC (nid=802E) missing required column (10970003)

!!TC (nid=804E) missing required column (10970003)

!!TC (nid=806E) missing required column (10970003)

!!TC (nid=808E) missing required column (10970003)

!!TC (nid=80AE) missing required column (10970003)

!!TC (nid=80CE) missing required column (10970003)

!!TC (nid=80EE) missing required column (10970003)

!!TC (nid=810E) missing required column (10970003)

!!TC (nid=812E) missing required column (10970003)

!!TC (nid=814E) missing required column (10970003)

!!TC (nid=816E) missing required column (10970003)

!!TC (nid=818E) missing required column (10970003)

**Attempting to locate any orphaned folders/messages

**Attempting to check top-level objects for consistency

??Deleting SDO

**Updating folder hierarchy

**Attempting to fix original file

**Attempting to copy back BBT


Fatal Error: 80040886, dwErr=0

 

[Brian Tillman]

I have several PST's that have never grown over 150MB of size, they
were created in Outlook XP - and still work when I open them in
Outlook XP on another machine.

I upgraded to Office 2003 SP2 with MSPST32.DLL (version 11.0.6566.0),
and I now get the list of folders inside the PST OK, but when I click
a folder with items in it I get "the folder has reached is maximum
size". And I'm adviced to delete / cleanup items (but I can't see
any!).

Again, the files are <200MB and when I copy the same file over to a
PC with Outlook XP I can read the file just fine. And if I run
SCANPST on the Outlook XP machine (ScanPST.exe v5.5.2174.0) this
validates the file - no issues found.

If this were happening to me, I'd use OL 2002 to create new PSTs for each
and copy the contents of each old one to a new one and then try the new one
in OL 2003.

 

[dotBATman]

Problem turned out to be a policy set for testing purposes by the Outlook
deployment team.

4 values under
[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Outlook\PST] were
set to low values.

Two problems:
- Outlook would tell you that "you have to clean up your folder, it is too
big" - and then would not let you access the folder because it was too big.
How do we clean up if we can't read the data??
- PST Repair tool did not manage to repair the folders when this setting was
in place!!

Once I deleted the policy Outlook 2003 would read the files just fine, and
SCANPST would repair them (minor issues).

Best regards,
dotBATman