[pollyizz]

Is it possible to reinstall Windows Mail only? I am thinking that may help my problem of being unable to delete the mail in my delted folder? I am currently using Windos Vista as my Op system

[spdabbs]

Have you tried running a command prompt as Administrator, then running sfc /scannow - that may fix it?

[Triple6]

I don't have any Vista computers handy, but in OE there was an option to Compact Folders and it was located under Files -> Folders and it could resolve issues when folders were misbehaving.

[spdabbs]

I think similar is in Tools - Options - Advanced - Maintenance

[Triple6]

Looks like you can change the it so it compacts every exit, you may want to change the 100 to 1 and then close Mail and re-open it and see if it helped. Maybe the option to manually do it is no longer included.

[techy689]

Try going through Add/Remove Windows Components. Remove it, restart, and then add it again.

[Italian]

No, Microsoft Mail cannot be uninstalled and reinstalled since it is part of the Operating System.
But, it can be rebuilt.

There is currently no patch available for the problem of emails not dispaying and not allowing you to empty deleted emails or delete them one by one using the delete command.

I too, received the error code "Message could not be displayed
Outlook Express encountered an unexpected problem while displaying this message. Check your computer for low memory or low disk space and try again."

I tried several fixes and database repair programs to no avail.


The following process worked for me:

Make sure that Windows Mail is closed when you do the next steps.

Go to the folder C:\users\%your computer name\AppData\Local\Microsoft\ and copy the “Windows Mail” folder to another place on your hard drive for backup purposes so you will not lose any important emails.

Go back to the C:\users\%your computer name\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Mail\ folder and delete ALL of the contents.

WINDOWS MAIL, SINCE IT IS PART OF THE OPERATING SYSTEM WILL REBUILD THE FILES NEEDED TO RUN.

Open Windows Mail.

In Windows Mail, Go to File-Import-Messages

Select Microsoft Windows Mail 7, select next.

Browse to the location that you save the backup copy of Windows Mail. Then select OK.

Your messages will then be imported back into Windows Mail.

You will notice a folder that will be called “Recovered Messages”

Now, depending on what folders you had, recreate those under the Local Folders heading.

Go back to the folders of the messages you recovered, you will notice messages that were not removable before still there.

THE FOLLOWING WILL TAKE SOME TIME, BUT WILL REPAIR YOUR PROBLEM.

Locate each email that has NO Heading and highlight each one and hit the delete key, they will be placed into your Deleted Items folder, you must not go too fast or try to highlight and delete them all at once or you will get the error message again,.

Once you get to the emails that you want to keep from the Recovered folders, highlight all the messages by clicking on the first one, holding down the Ctrl key and selecting the last one.

Right click on the messages you highlighted and click “Move to Folder”, then select the folder you want them moved to.

Once the files have been moved, delete to folder that they were moved from (Makes it easier to keep track of where you are at.

Then go to your Deleted Items folder, right click and hit Empty “Deleted Items” Folder.

Hope this helps.

It also helps to change your setting under Tools-Options in the tab of “Advanced” under “Maintenance” Where the heading of “Cleaning up Messages” is located, check the box for “Empty messages from the “Deleted Items” Folder on exit. That way, your emails are removed and hopefully the problem stays gone.

Let me know if it works for you.

John

[Rich-M]

Wow nice informative solution Italian!!!!

[wdroese]

Thanks for info on windows mail (Re-installing). Windows Mail Spell Check was not working (got encounnted error msg). Followed your procedure of deleting files and importing messages and spell check works again on windows mail. Thanks, Bill

[RossCoeH]

The process seemed to work but beware of moving files back to out of the recovered files section.
I had case where 3 files were in outbox, and the first file had message "Message could not be displayed : Windows Mail encountered an unexpected problem while displaying this message. Check your computer for low memory or low disk space and try again." Net effect was emails could come in, but no emails could be sent out because of the error in the first item of the queue.


in looking at mail folders there were only 2 messages in outbox and therefore the index was wrong but no way of repairing it except as above by deleting the WindowsMail.MSMessageStore as above. Worked fine and all files appeared to be recovered and I could view them but the moment I moved one file from the recovered folder to the Inbox, I got the old error back on any remaining messages in that recovered folder. It would be nice if Microsoft added feature to rebuild the database - the external program Wmutil.exe could not repair my problem either

[birdy48]

Thank you --it worked for me also. Birdy48

[debbiesg]

I copied my folder and then deleted the folders then tried to open windows mail. It does nothing. Help.
Debbie

[littleminx]

debbiesg it appears that one step was left out - after deleting the contents of your folder you will need to shut down and re-start [reboot] your computer to have the change take affect.

FYI; thanks for this tip - i've searched every avenue to repair the Windows Mail spell check function - this worked!

Another tip; Save yourself a lot of time and headaches by NOT using the IMPORT feature. Once you've rebooted, restructure your "new" mailbox by adding back your accounts and folders manually, once done simply locate the Local folder inside the previously copied Windows Mail folder and drag the mail from it into your new box. [it won't look like mail in the copied folder [it appears as a number], but will once you've drug it back into the new box.

[TucsonBill]

The procedures above worked well. The only difficulty I had was when it came to "Make sure that Windows Mail is closed when you do the next steps." At this instruction, we closed all of the open windows. We could not complete the copy or delete step because Windows Mail process was still running, and some of the files were locked because of this. We ended up killing mail process from task manager process list. At this point, the steps documented by Italian, and the short cut from "littleminx" worked like champs.

There must be a cleaner way to stop the Windows Mail process - how?

Thanks for the assistance!