[pchelpers] Re: oohhh I just could kick myself!!!

Hi

You did not provide more detail.

> Hi : I  launch Outlook Express backup-- backed it up  

What is the *exact* name of the program?
What did you do to make a backup? Where did you make the backup go?

> and then I  thought I 
> would test it I  did a restore. I opened my outlook express and all my email 
> in the inbox was gone. The rest stayed intacked--  yoiks!!!

When you do a restore, you overwrite the current, existing messages. The 
only way to safely test an email backup is to first make a new identity 
and to make sure that the files go there. There is very little chance of 
you getting your inbox emails back. It's like copying a new novel with 1 
page called novel.doc into a folder containing a 200-page novel in a 
file with the same name. The only way you can get the 200-page novel 
back is through data recovery, and only those bits that were not 
overwritten (and even a 1-page novel takes up a lot of room in Word's 
bloated format).

In this case, however, you do have some hope left before attempting data 
recovery software. It could be that the backup file you used to 
overwrite the inbox file is just corrupted but not unusable, i.e. it can 
perhaps be repaired. In order to keep the data recovery option open, 
however, you should not do anything on your computer until you've made 
backups of all existing files called Inbox.dbx. Basically, you are now 
in the position of someone who has deleted an important file from the 
recycle bin; the file is still intact, but any bits of any new files 
saved can be written over the now unprotected important file.

Do you know where the mail folder is located? Tools < options < 
maintenance IIRC. If you're not 100% sure, then do a system-wide search 
for Inbox.dbx in *all* folders, including hidden ones under advanced 
options. Hopefully these will not all be files so small that they cannot 
contain your email messages (in corrupted form). Then make backups of 
all files you find called Inbox.dbx and put each in a separate subfolder 
with a name *clearly* explaining where it came from, all inside a main 
folder called Inbox Backups. Then copy the main folder with all 
subfolders onto a CD or USB flash drive. Then copy them to a different 
computer and rename the files to Inbox1.dbx Inbox2.dbx etc. Then try to 
import these into Outlook Express on the new computer. If they don't 
seem to contain any mail but are not really small files, there are ways 
that may be able to repair them.




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