Recovering lost Outlook Express messages

[David H]

I have just found over 1000 messages have been wiped from my inbox. Although most were due to go anyway some may have been useful to keep and whatever happened to the system it dumped them straight off and are nowhere to be seen.

Is there a recovery programme I can download to get them back from my hard drive or should I just accept the loss and move on?

[VHG]

Are they perhaps in your deleted items folder?

Outlook Express messages are usually download from your ISPs server to your computer (and do not remain on the ISPs server).

However there is an option in Outlook Express to say leave them on the server AS WELL.

If this option is set they MAY still be on the ISPs server.

I have my Outlook Express set to leave the files on the ISPs server as well as being on my own PC.

If I have important emails I usually copy and paste them out to Word or Notepad and save them that way. Then I can delete them from my email system.

I have emails going back years saved as Word and Notepad documents that are no longer in my email system.

[wildwood]

If you have the folders list showing on the left press the Local Folders one, that will show you instantly how many mails are in each folder.

If it is not showing, go to the view tab and click Layout to make sure the 'Folders List' is ticked.

[David H]

I think the programme crashed and when I reloaded it every folder was intact except the inbox which has (0). On XP the recycle bin doesn't keep everything like it did on 98 so seems to keep itself empty besides the odd bit of rubbish it keeps for a short time first.
I know there are programs you can use to recover files but so far the cheapest was $29 which is about $28.99 more than these emails were worth. Are there any free apps I can download as so far they don't seem to be popping up but I suspect they're out there.

[Old_Geezer]

You pretty much get what you pay for unless you illegally borrow a friend's.
Even if you buy a good recovery programme then you can't be sure it'll find and repair the lost files. Not so bad if you can get one on a trial period.

[David H]

VHG, my ISP didn't save emails till a week ago when they upgraded and now do them by default. Where would the option be on the OE menu though just in case- I've had a look but can't figure out what to do.

[David H]

Thanks zlatan, I got oe recovery free but it somehow managed to get stuff going back 4 years and nothing at all recent, so shows when things go wrong they do it properly. I'm guessing what I managed to find is the same program as yours as there weren't any others which applied to it specifically. I presume some items must remain on the hard disk as writable memory while others somehow vanish beyond the range of anything.

[David H]

I've got the basic recovery programme which managed everything from the beginning to about 2008, but somehow the ones between then and the sudden loss appear to have been wiped better than a dodgy accountant's. I'll try yours and report back as although I've coped without them since it would probably have a few pretty useful ones hidden away amongst the rest which was why I'd saved them.