# Outlook 2003 File Not Closed Properly?



## jangell2 (May 16, 2006)

Almost everytime I start up Outlook 2003 it produces the following message: "The data file Personal Folders was not closed properly. The file is being checked for problems."

Outlook than spends a couple of minutes checking the file. It always passes the check, but OL will not complete loading and reading new messages until this check is done. I have recently deleted a bunch of messages and then compacted the file, and this did not eliminate the problem.

I am running Win XP Pro with MS Office Pro 2003 on an AMD Athlon 64 3500+. Any thoughts on what is causing this?


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## StumpedTechy (Jul 7, 2004)

Have you created a new PST to see if its a problem with outlook or a problem with the PST? you can always import the old data if its a PST problem.


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## jangell2 (May 16, 2006)

StumpedTechy said:


> Have you created a new PST to see if its a problem with outlook or a problem with the PST? you can always import the old data if its a PST problem.


No I haven't done that. This is a file I've had for quite a long time. Is it difficult to create a new file and import the data?


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## Rude_Dog (Dec 18, 2006)

Hi. I hope I'm not crashing your thread...

My Outlook 2002 SP3 does the same thing. (I used to use Outlook Express, and I often miss it dearly, but converted over to Outlook 2002 because it came with/supported features of my smartphone gadget).

Anyhoo, while the jury is still out on this, it seems like this problem happens when I shut down the computer with Outlook 2002 still running. While it appears the Outlook 2002 window closes (as it should) with all of the other open programs, the computer seems to take a while longer to complete shutdown and turn off. However, if I close Outlook 2002 well before computer shutdown, then the computer's shutdown doesn't seem to take as long, and the next time I boot up and start Outlook 2002, it seems to start just fine.

This makes me think, at least in my case, that the issue is that Outlook is unable to make the OS wait until it's finished closing completely, before the OS continues it's shutdown processes. Or, Outlook 2002 is supposed to conform to some minimal program closing time specification and doesn't, and is given the equivalent of "end task" command by the OS, then the OS continues shutting down.

My real beef is that as Outlook 2002 is starting up, it takes over the whole computer, and I can do nothing else with it while Outlook 2002 is starting. And, AND, this includes the stupid "checking file" process. If the checking file process could take some lower priority, at least I could do something else while it's doing its file checking thing.


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## jangell2 (May 16, 2006)

I haven't had the problem for some time now. I'm not entirely sure why the problem has stopped. I wonder if its related to getting rid of Norton?

There is a program called SCANPST.EXE which is on your hard drive. Just do a search for it. Its from MS and its for fixing the pst file. I ran this and the problem didn't go away but I kept running it. Maybe it took multiple tries, I don't know.


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## jangell2 (May 16, 2006)

I forgot to mention that I've always had the habit of manually closing all applications, including Outlook (mine is 2003, SP2). I was still having the problem, even though I was closing the app before shutting down Windows.


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