A few weeks ago my hard drive crashed. When I say crashed, I mean the
head crashed but the platters were still accessible. The hard drive
went to a data recovery place, where they rebuilt it in a clean room.
5 cds later, and $1800, they give me what they think is my data.

The most important files on the hard drive are my *.pst files, my 4
Outlook personal folder files. These are contacts and business mailing
lists. Unrecoverable data.

One of the files, the main one, called 'mailbox' appears to be okay,
if you look at it via properties. It is over 150 mb, which is where it
should be.

I cannot open it in Outlook. If I try via File, Open, and navigate to
the file (which I have copied from cd to new hard drive"), I get the
following error message:

   "The file C:\... is not a personal folders file."

The file has the *.pst extension, and says personal folders file in a
file explorer window.

The file is not tagged read only. I don't know what to do. 

I then went to the microsoft outlook website and read that I should do
the following:

Go to Start, Run, and type in c:\program files\common
files\system\mapi\1033\scanpst.exe. I did this. It went through the
file, found errors, made a backup, and I got the 'file repaired'
message.

So now, when I open Outlook, navigate to the file to open, I get no
error message, but more importantly, I get no data.

I think that is all the information that I can give you at this point.
Please feel free to ask for clarification if you have the need.

I really am hoping that this is an easy answer for someone. If I am
told that I need to raise the price, I certainly will.

Thank you.

I have heard anecdotally that after fixing the file once, you should
change one letter in the file and then run scanpst again to fix
properly.

To do this, get a hex editor from:

http://directory.google.com/Top/Computers/Software/Freeware/Editors/Hex_Editors/

Then, change one letter within the "fixed" file to something else (for
instance, change an "a" to a "b" or something).

Then run the scanpst tool again. Apparently, this may make a
difference (strange, I know).

Good luck,

--seizer-ga

When you say that you "get no data", can you see in your folder list
that the second PST file has been opened, yet you just see no
messages, or does absolutely nothing happen when you try to open it?

If you do see the second PST file (mailbox) in your folder list, does
it contain the correct folders from the PST file, but no data within
the folders?

-PWizard

In regards to pwizard - absolutely nothing happens to the folders,
etc. meaning the standards are there, inbox, drafts, calendar,
contacts, deleted, etc. i had tons of subfolders, so i know that none
are here.

Thanks!

Seizer -

Interesting... I did as you said. When I reran scanpst it said there
were '4 folders' in this file. Which there would be. Wait, let me try
another *.pst file. Just tried 2 others. Didn't do a thing. :o(

Thanks for the idea though! Any more will be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

According to this TechNet article:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=KB;en-us;287497&

..with Outlook 2002 (XP), after running the repair toolkit, all of the
folders *should* be empty. It supposively creates a new additional
folder called "Lost and Found" where it places all recoverable items
which you are supposed to move back to their respective original
folders. I don't remember this being the case with earlier versions of
Outlook, but I'm not sure. Can you look to see if you have this new
"Lost and Found" folder in your repaired PST file after opening it? It
may be a subfolder of one of the other main folders.

Just an idea...
-PWizard

It may be time now to attempt a commercial product.

A company called ForMorph makes a program called Message Converter. It
will import from Outlook, and export into a generic format which
Outlook should be able to read back in.

They make a trial version which runs for 30 days, but cuts off the
messages it converts after 500 characters. Still, if it works, it's
only $20, so it's worth considering.

You can download the demonstration here:
http://www.fkeeps.com/fmorph/demo.htm

Let us know if that works.

PWizard - no lost and found fodler created, although it does create a
folder called "recovered", which is empty. Thanks for the thought
though!

Seizer - I will probably try Morph when every other alternative is
ruled out. While my email messages are important, more important are
the contacts and calendar items. Did I mention that my Palm dies the
week before my hard drive? ;o)

Thanks!