Are you having problems with your PST (personal folders) in Outlook 2007? If so, there is a simple way to take care of any issue or corruption you may have with your PST. Outlook automatically includes a PST repair tool called ScanPST.
ScanPST can save your PST if you see this message:
FileName.pst file could not be opened. The file may not be compatible with this version of Outlook or it may be corrupted.
In Windows Vista, you may see an error message when you start Outlook 2007 that says:
<FileName>.pst file could not be opened
NOTE: These two things are very important to repair your PST, so do them first.
- Make sure Outlook 2007 is closed
- Locate the PST file that you will be repairing and note that location so you can get back to it later.
Once you have completed the previous two steps, navigate to C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office12 (where “C” is the letter of your hard drive) and find the SCANPST utility.
Double click on the ScanPST utility and the Repair window will open. Click the “Browse” button and navigate to the location where your PST lives and select the PST you want to repair.
The name of your PST will show in the window. Click the “Start” button to begin scanning your PST. There is no need to worry as this only does a scan on your PST and does NOT make any changes. This will only detect any problems.
The scan will go through 8 steps. The amount of time it will take to complete, depends on the size of your PST.
When the scan completes you will see the summary window of what the scan found. The important part is that it will tell you if you have any error in your PST.
Now you can repair your corrupt PST. I highly recommend making a backup of your PST before you repair just to be safe. So check the box to make a backup and click the “Browse” button to select a location for your backup. (Save the backup to your desktop since the repair will be fine and you can delete the backup when you are done.) Now click the “Repair” button to repair the PST.
The repair will process your PST and complete and you will see a confirmation message that the repair is complete.
You can now delete the backup that you made and saved to your desktop. Open Outlook 2007 and you shouldn’t see any more issues with your PST and Outlook 2007.
There is a similar program-pst repair,recovering lost Microsoft Outlook data is a sequence of operations involving scanning, identifying and saving such Microsoft Outlook items as messages, contacts, notes, reminders, journals, meetings, etc,recover data when a *.pst file completely or partially stops functioning, for example, it becomes completely or partially unreadable because of other applications, antivirus software or power failures,scans, identifies and saves data from the pst file without modifying or indexing the source pst file.
really very nice posting. It provides very useful information
when your pst file get corrupted. The scanpst tool is very helpful.I also know a pst recovery software that provides powerful recovery solution.It is very easy to use since user friendly.
Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Very clear directions and most helpful!
@leslie – glad the article helped you
Thanks. It has excellent instructions and it processed through as one would expect.
@Frank – Your welcome
I heard a popular Outlook recovery tool called Advanced Outlook Repair is also availabe for repairing your PST file. It is a powerful tool to recover messages, folders and other objects from corrupt or damaged Microsoft Outlook PST files.
Hope this can help!
how do you use the outlook.bak file to replace the outlook.pst file if there is a problem?
Respected Sir,
Thanks a lot.
muchas gracias por su ayuda….
fue Exitosa y de gran utilidaa.
my scanpst utility does not open and is dated 2003. My outlook is 2007. how do i download the updated 2007 scanpst utility?
For many users scanPST will be a big help, and you’ve provided a very nice description of how to use this tool effectively. For users who don’t get good results with scanPST, there are third-party PST Repair tools, such as our Stellar Outlook PST Repair, which is now available as version 3.0 and as a free download so you can test it out on any damaged .pst files. We just added a blog to our site with useful information that builds on what you’ve written here:
Stellar Outlook PST Repair blog
I’m pretty experienced with Outlook, pst files and scanpst.exe, but have hit a problem I can’t solve. Anytime I download any email to outlook, then scan it with scanpst.exe, it shows that the pst file has errors. I can repair the errors (usually takes 2-3 runs of scanpst.exe to fix the errors) but then, as soon as I download another email, it shows errors again. I have created a brand new pst file and the problem still exists. I have repaired outlook. I have uninstalled and reinstalled outlook. Nothing fixes it. I am on Vista, with Office 2007. Any ideas?
Very helpful
Thank`s a lot!!!! I was lost and this topic saved-me. Amazing!
Thanks it’s so useful!!
Thanks a bunch – migrated from XPSP3 to Win7 (new work laptop). This is making the transition, and dealing with a corrupted .pst a little less painful.
Again, thanks!
-t
Fantastic Tool… thanks for the advise
thanks this help me to solve my problem
Thank you!!! My Outlook is working again.
work well thank you a lot
Anna