{"id":192,"date":"2013-05-26T20:58:36","date_gmt":"2013-05-26T20:58:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/?p=192"},"modified":"2025-10-09T16:15:33","modified_gmt":"2025-10-09T20:15:33","slug":"just-compacted-my-messages-and-lost-some-on-my-inbox-help","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/just-compacted-my-messages-and-lost-some-on-my-inbox-help\/","title":{"rendered":"Just compacted Outlook Express and lost some messages on my Inbox, what to do!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>(This information is for Windows XP users still using Outlook Express 6. Please note that your email provider most probably has all your messages stored on POP, which you&#8217;ll see when you upgrade. )<\/p>\n<p>It could happen suddenly, the reminder to compact your messages appearing just as you&#8217;ve meant to click somewhere else. So you curse your bad luck when you click it unintentionally, but you don&#8217;t dare interrupt it while it compacts, because they tell you not to, so there won&#8217;t be any loss of data. But your computer decides to stall at some point or crash and when you finally get back to Outlook Express, you see that most or all of your inbox messages have just disappeared. NOOOOOOOOOO !<\/p>\n<p>DON&#8217;T PANIC..<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/dreamstime_xs_4634001.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-193\" src=\"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/dreamstime_xs_4634001-300x206.jpg\" alt=\"https:\/\/www.dreamstime.com\/stock-image-business-woman-panic-image4634001\" width=\"300\" height=\"206\" srcset=\"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/dreamstime_xs_4634001-300x206.jpg 300w, https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/dreamstime_xs_4634001.jpg 480w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>If you carefully follow these instructions, you may be able to recover them.<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>First CLOSE Outlook Express.<\/li>\n<li>Hopefully you haven\u2019t emptied your recycle bin yet. DON\u2019T EMPTY IT.<\/li>\n<li>Click to open your Recycle Bin and do check it. Do you see any files that end in .bak, like drafts.bak, sent.bak, and especially inbox.bak. If you do, it\u2019s recoverable. But DON\u2019T right-click and choose restore YET. (If you don&#8217;t see the files there, they may be in another folder, which you&#8217;ll get to later. At any case, they&#8217;ll have the .bak extension.)<\/li>\n<li>If you\u2019re not already viewing details, choose VIEW from the top menu, and click on DETAILS. This is so you can see the original file location.<\/li>\n<li>The original file location could look something like this:\n<ul>\n<li>C:\\Documents and Settings\\<strong>Default<\/strong>\\Local Settings\\Application Data\\Identities\\<strong>some string<\/strong>\\inbox.bak<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>(<strong>Default<\/strong> could be some other name,<strong> some string<\/strong> is the string that you were given, which is different for different users.)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>You\u2019re going to have to find that original folder, but you might have to reveal hidden files and folders to do so. Local Settings are usually hidden.\n<ul>\n<li>Click START, Choose CONTROL PANEL, and Click FOLDER OPTIONS (for Windows 7, you\u2019ll have to click on APPEARANCE AND PERSONALIZATION link first before you can click on FOLDER OPTIONS.) Then click VIEW and look in the ADVANCED SETTINGS Window for SHOW HIDDEN FILES AND FOLDERS. Click that radio button if it isn\u2019t already chosen, then click the OK button.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>Now you&#8217;re ready. Find that folder, and look for an inbox.dbx. That is your current INBOX.<\/li>\n<li>Right-click inbox.dbx and rename it inbox2.dbx, just in case<\/li>\n<li>Now you can go back to your Recycle Bin, right click inbox.bak, and choose RESTORE.<\/li>\n<li>That file inbox.bak should now be in the folder you just found.<\/li>\n<li>Right click inbox.bak and rename it inbox.dbx<\/li>\n<li>Now open Outlook Express and your inbox messages should be restored.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>OR if that doesn&#8217;t work ..<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>From the Outlook Express Top Menu, click File &gt; Import &gt; Messages &gt; Choose the email program you use<\/li>\n<li>If it was Outlook Express 6, then choose &gt;Import Mail from an OE6 Store Directory<\/li>\n<li>&gt; Click OK, and browse for that folder you just found<\/li>\n<li>&gt; Click and choose inbox.dbx or whichever file you want to restore<\/li>\n<li>and voila, those messages should be restored.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Hope this helps.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.thundercloud.net\/infoave\/tips\/compacting\/\">Click here for more information on compacting messages.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-comments\"><h2 id=\"comments\" class=\"wp-block-comments-title\">6 responses to &#8220;Just compacted Outlook Express and lost some messages on my Inbox, what to do!&#8221;<\/h2>\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-comment-template\"><li id=\"comment-2580\" class=\"comment even thread-even depth-1\">\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-9d6595d7 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\" style=\"flex-basis:40px\"><div class=\"wp-block-avatar\">  <\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\"><div class=\"wp-block-comment-author-name has-small-font-size\">Dheeraj Sharma<\/div>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group is-layout-flex wp-block-group-is-layout-flex\" style=\"margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:0px\"><div class=\"wp-block-comment-date has-small-font-size\"><time datetime=\"2015-02-03T14:03:09-05:00\"><a href=\"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/just-compacted-my-messages-and-lost-some-on-my-inbox-help\/#comment-2580\">February 3, 2015<\/a><\/time><\/div>\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-comment-content\"><p>thank you so much its work great<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-comment-reply-link has-small-font-size\"><a rel=\"nofollow\" class=\"comment-reply-link\" href=\"#comment-2580\" data-commentid=\"2580\" data-postid=\"192\" data-belowelement=\"comment-2580\" data-respondelement=\"respond\" data-replyto=\"Reply to Dheeraj Sharma\" aria-label=\"Reply to Dheeraj Sharma\">Reply<\/a><\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n<\/li><li id=\"comment-3415\" class=\"comment odd alt thread-odd thread-alt depth-1\">\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-9d6595d7 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\" style=\"flex-basis:40px\"><div class=\"wp-block-avatar\">  <\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\"><div class=\"wp-block-comment-author-name has-small-font-size\">Mudit<\/div>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group is-layout-flex wp-block-group-is-layout-flex\" style=\"margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:0px\"><div class=\"wp-block-comment-date has-small-font-size\"><time datetime=\"2015-06-25T10:43:24-04:00\"><a href=\"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/just-compacted-my-messages-and-lost-some-on-my-inbox-help\/#comment-3415\">June 25, 2015<\/a><\/time><\/div>\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-comment-content\"><p>thank you so much&#8230;.you are a big savior!!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-comment-reply-link has-small-font-size\"><a rel=\"nofollow\" class=\"comment-reply-link\" href=\"#comment-3415\" data-commentid=\"3415\" data-postid=\"192\" data-belowelement=\"comment-3415\" data-respondelement=\"respond\" data-replyto=\"Reply to Mudit\" aria-label=\"Reply to Mudit\">Reply<\/a><\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n<\/li><li id=\"comment-4572\" class=\"comment even thread-even depth-1\">\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-9d6595d7 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\" style=\"flex-basis:40px\"><div class=\"wp-block-avatar\">  <\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\"><div class=\"wp-block-comment-author-name has-small-font-size\">daniel<\/div>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group is-layout-flex wp-block-group-is-layout-flex\" style=\"margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:0px\"><div class=\"wp-block-comment-date has-small-font-size\"><time datetime=\"2016-02-15T07:18:17-05:00\"><a href=\"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/just-compacted-my-messages-and-lost-some-on-my-inbox-help\/#comment-4572\">February 15, 2016<\/a><\/time><\/div>\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-comment-content\"><p>Thank you so much it helps a lot!!!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-comment-reply-link has-small-font-size\"><a rel=\"nofollow\" class=\"comment-reply-link\" href=\"#comment-4572\" data-commentid=\"4572\" data-postid=\"192\" data-belowelement=\"comment-4572\" data-respondelement=\"respond\" data-replyto=\"Reply to daniel\" aria-label=\"Reply to daniel\">Reply<\/a><\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n<\/li><li id=\"comment-8029\" class=\"comment odd alt thread-odd thread-alt depth-1\">\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-9d6595d7 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\" style=\"flex-basis:40px\"><div class=\"wp-block-avatar\">  <\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\"><div class=\"wp-block-comment-author-name has-small-font-size\">James Smith<\/div>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group is-layout-flex wp-block-group-is-layout-flex\" style=\"margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:0px\"><div class=\"wp-block-comment-date has-small-font-size\"><time datetime=\"2017-05-24T05:30:50-04:00\"><a href=\"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/just-compacted-my-messages-and-lost-some-on-my-inbox-help\/#comment-8029\">May 24, 2017<\/a><\/time><\/div>\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-comment-content\"><p>Hi<br \/>\nYou can follow this tutorial as well the take the backup of your Outlook Express Emails. And once you get your mails backup you can save them into another file format for further corruption or any other damage. You can try Outlook Express to Outlook Converter for this process. This will help you to save your Outlook Express emails within few steps. <\/p>\n<p>For more info, you can check the link<br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/download.freedownloadmanager.org\/Windows-PC\/SysTools-DBX-Converter\/FREE-4.3.html\" rel=\"nofollow ugc\">https:\/\/download.freedownloadmanager.org\/Windows-PC\/SysTools-DBX-Converter\/FREE-4.3.html<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-comment-reply-link has-small-font-size\"><a rel=\"nofollow\" class=\"comment-reply-link\" href=\"#comment-8029\" data-commentid=\"8029\" data-postid=\"192\" data-belowelement=\"comment-8029\" data-respondelement=\"respond\" data-replyto=\"Reply to James Smith\" aria-label=\"Reply to James Smith\">Reply<\/a><\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n<\/li><li id=\"comment-12141\" class=\"comment even thread-even depth-1\">\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns is-layout-flex wp-container-core-columns-is-layout-9d6595d7 wp-block-columns-is-layout-flex\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\" style=\"flex-basis:40px\"><div class=\"wp-block-avatar\">  <\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column is-layout-flow wp-block-column-is-layout-flow\"><div class=\"wp-block-comment-author-name has-small-font-size\">Nirav Shah<\/div>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group is-layout-flex wp-block-group-is-layout-flex\" style=\"margin-top:0px;margin-bottom:0px\"><div class=\"wp-block-comment-date has-small-font-size\"><time datetime=\"2018-08-24T03:15:09-04:00\"><a href=\"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/just-compacted-my-messages-and-lost-some-on-my-inbox-help\/#comment-12141\">August 24, 2018<\/a><\/time><\/div>\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-comment-content\"><p>When I try to import it says no messages can be found in this folder even though the messages are there.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-comment-reply-link has-small-font-size\"><a rel=\"nofollow\" class=\"comment-reply-link\" href=\"#comment-12141\" data-commentid=\"12141\" data-postid=\"192\" data-belowelement=\"comment-12141\" data-respondelement=\"respond\" data-replyto=\"Reply to Nirav Shah\" aria-label=\"Reply to Nirav Shah\">Reply<\/a><\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n<\/li><\/ol>\n\n\n\n\t<div id=\"respond\" class=\"comment-respond wp-block-post-comments-form\">\n\t\t<h3 id=\"reply-title\" class=\"comment-reply-title\">Leave a Reply <small><a rel=\"nofollow\" id=\"cancel-comment-reply-link\" href=\"\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192#respond\" style=\"display:none;\">Cancel reply<\/a><\/small><\/h3><form action=\"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/wp-comments-post.php\" method=\"post\" id=\"commentform\" class=\"comment-form\"><p class=\"comment-notes\"><span id=\"email-notes\">Your email address will not be published.<\/span> <span class=\"required-field-message\">Required fields are marked <span class=\"required\">*<\/span><\/span><\/p><p class=\"comment-form-comment\"><label for=\"comment\">Comment <span class=\"required\">*<\/span><\/label> <textarea id=\"comment\" name=\"comment\" cols=\"45\" rows=\"8\" maxlength=\"65525\" required><\/textarea><\/p><p class=\"comment-form-author\"><label for=\"author\">Name <span class=\"required\">*<\/span><\/label> <input id=\"author\" name=\"author\" type=\"text\" value=\"\" size=\"30\" maxlength=\"245\" autocomplete=\"name\" required \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"comment-form-email\"><label for=\"email\">Email <span class=\"required\">*<\/span><\/label> <input id=\"email\" name=\"email\" type=\"email\" value=\"\" size=\"30\" maxlength=\"100\" aria-describedby=\"email-notes\" autocomplete=\"email\" required \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"comment-form-url\"><label for=\"url\">Website<\/label> <input id=\"url\" name=\"url\" type=\"url\" value=\"\" size=\"30\" maxlength=\"200\" autocomplete=\"url\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"form-submit\"><input name=\"submit\" type=\"submit\" id=\"submit\" class=\"submit\" value=\"Post Comment\" \/> <input type='hidden' name='comment_post_ID' value='192' id='comment_post_ID' \/>\n<input type='hidden' name='comment_parent' id='comment_parent' value='0' \/>\n<\/p><p style=\"display: none;\"><input type=\"hidden\" id=\"akismet_comment_nonce\" name=\"akismet_comment_nonce\" value=\"d4c43035eb\" \/><\/p><p style=\"display: none !important;\" class=\"akismet-fields-container\" data-prefix=\"ak_\"><label>&#916;<textarea name=\"ak_hp_textarea\" cols=\"45\" rows=\"8\" maxlength=\"100\"><\/textarea><\/label><input type=\"hidden\" id=\"ak_js_1\" name=\"ak_js\" value=\"215\"\/><script>document.getElementById( \"ak_js_1\" ).setAttribute( \"value\", ( new Date() ).getTime() );<\/script><\/p><\/form>\t<\/div><!-- #respond -->\n\t<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(This information is for Windows XP users still using Outlook Express 6. Please note that your email provider most probably has all your messages stored on POP, which you&#8217;ll see when you upgrade. ) It could happen suddenly, the reminder to compact your messages appearing just as you&#8217;ve meant to click somewhere else. So you [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-192","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-lucarinfo-blog","7":"entry"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=192"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/192\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=192"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=192"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lucarinfo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=192"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}