Outlook.pst file "not a personal folders file" plus other big mess-up problem

Discussion in 'other software & services' started by acr1965, Aug 15, 2007.

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  1. acr1965

    acr1965 Registered Member

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    I have MS XP Home edition and I keep getting an error message when I try to launch Outlook 2007 that says-

    "Cannot start Microsoft Office Outlook. Cannot open Outlook window. The set of folders canot be opened. The file C:\Documents and settings\Owner\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook\Outlook.pst is not a personal folders file."

    I have tried everything and nothing works to either fix or replace the file. I have tried scanpst.exe but the file Outlook.pst is not recognized. It is not checked as "read only" and the size is 0 bytes. So it seems to be corrupted.

    But I cannot remove or reinstall Outlook or Office 2007. I keep getting an error when I try that and the removal process is rolled back. All the rest of the Office 2007 products work fine.

    What caused this whole mess was that I was defragging with Paragon Harddisk manager and decided to stop it during the process by clicking the "exit" or "quit" button, whichever it was. Paragon stopped scanning and then XP automatically started scanning my C drive. When that stopped and I was back at my desktop Outlook would not open.

    The worst part is that now when I try to launch Paragon I get a message that says-

    "Operation failed
    Could not read application settings. File settings.xml does not exist. Please contact your system administrator to resolve the problem."

    Paragon will not uninstall now. I reinstalled a new copy over the old one but I still get the above message.

    Any suggestions? Will this cause me to have to reformat my computer? I have HP Pavilian which has the backup disks built in so maybe it will not be a horrible experience. Just time consuming.

    Appreciate any comments or suggestions.
    Thanks
     
  2. Aerowinder

    Aerowinder Registered Member

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    Did you try running chkdsk /f on your partitions by chance?
     
  3. acr1965

    acr1965 Registered Member

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    will try that

    update- tried that but I still get the same error messages.
     
    Last edited: Aug 16, 2007
  4. screamer

    screamer Registered Member

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    Have you tried: Help - Detect and Repair in Outlook?

    ...screamer
     
  5. acr1965

    acr1965 Registered Member

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    I used Microsoft Office Diagnostics but it did not help. If Help-Detect and Repair is on Outlook then it is not accessible.

    Will probably just restore my system this weekend as that looks like the last thing to try. Heck, even System Restore will not work. Every date I try, even going back to last month does not restore.
     
  6. Huupi

    Huupi Registered Member

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    It will not help you now but you may think of using an reliable Imaging app. like Shadow Protect or FDISR immediate system recovery or both.
     
  7. screamer

    screamer Registered Member

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    FD-ISR is the first app I install. Good call Huupi

    ...screamer
     
  8. ErikAlbert

    ErikAlbert Registered Member

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    Such problems are never a problem, if you use minimum an Image Backup Software.
    FDISR fixes this problem even faster. In my case one reboot (2 minuts) and there is no problem anymore.
     
  9. acr1965

    acr1965 Registered Member

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    Thanks for the suggestions.

    Quick question- the reason I decided to do a defrag with Paragon was to have a clean system then do a first time backup/snapshot. Obviously I never got to the second part of the plan. But what if I had a backup with Paragon and the same issue of stopping a defrag took place? Paragon will not open now at all or even uninstall.

    Would I have been able to access my backup even though Paragon would not have been accessible?
     
  10. ErikAlbert

    ErikAlbert Registered Member

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    Each decent Image Backup Software has a Recovery CD, including Paragon.
    If you can't use Paragon under Windows anymore, you insert the Recovery CD and reboot and you will be able to restore an image from your external harddisk or second internal harddisk via the Recovery CD.
    Of course you have to test this first.

    If you try something NEW, take a backup first.
     
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