Help- Corrupt oversize PST. Tried everything.

[juicejam]

Help- Corrupt oversize PST. Tried everything. 4.81GB file (2007 format) that worked well even at that size. Tried everything: scanpst, oversizedpst, and most of the third-party software out there. Nothing has worked.

In fact, most of the programs don't even open the file. Error message is usually "Not a valid pst or ost file." What to do? I have very valuable legal emails lost. I have some backed up but at least the last 12 months are gone!!!

 

[Diane Poremsky]

If it's 4.81 GB and is the 2007 format, it's not oversized, it's just corrupt. If Stellar's recovery program can't save it, it's probably too corrupt. Sorry.

You can try a combination of scanpst and chkdsk (or the equivalent). Sometimes a few passes with disk repair and scanpst is enough to recover.

 

[juicejam]

If it's 4.81 GB and is the 2007 format, it's not oversized, it's just corrupt. If Stellar's recovery program can't save it, it's probably too corrupt. Sorry.

You can try a combination of scanpst and chkdsk (or the equivalent). Sometimes a few passes with disk repair and scanpst is enough to recover.

Thanks Diane. That is good to know. I tried Stellar already. Regarding chkdsk, how do I do isolate the file to run this command? If I run from command prompt it runs the check on my entire hard drive, taking hours each time.

 

[Diane Poremsky]

unfortunately, you need to run it on the entire drive. I know of no way to run it on just part of the drive. But... if Stellar can't salvage it, I don't have much hope.

 

[juicejam]

unfortunately, you need to run it on the entire drive. I know of no way to run it on just part of the drive. But... if Stellar can't salvage it, I don't have much hope.

Ok thanks, I have an empty partition on my hard drive so am running chkdsk there. I am also scanning using Stellar once again. It has been running now for 4 minutes on stellar. Will update one way or the other in a few...

 

[juicejam]

Ok thanks, I have an empty partition on my hard drive so am running chkdsk there. I am also scanning using Stellar once again. It has been running now for 4 minutes on stellar. Will update one way or the other in a few...

No luck!!!! Yikes.

I saw somewhere that opening the file in a hex editor and removing some lines before running scanpst may work. Has anyone ever tried this before?

 

[Diane Poremsky]

No harm in trying it with a copy. It's used to corrupt password protected pst so you can remove the password.

 

[juicejam]

Tried lbefore but no luck!! I am stuck!!!

 

[Diane Poremsky]

Sorry If the commercial products can't recognize it and you don't have a backup, you are SOL. If you are working with a copy taken from another hard drive, it's possible the original might be salvageable, but otherwise, recovery is not looking good.

If recovering it at all costs is an option, a disk drive recovery specialist might be able to recover a usable copy, but that is expensive.

 

[juicejam]

Sorry If the commercial products can't recognize it and you don't have a backup, you are SOL. If you are working with a copy taken from another hard drive, it's possible the original might be salvageable, but otherwise, recovery is not looking good.

If recovering it at all costs is an option, a disk drive recovery specialist might be able to recover a usable copy, but that is expensive.

One disk drive recovery specialist said if scanpst doesn't work, they can't help!!!

Is there any known process with the hex editor option? What do I do to edit the file?

 

[Diane Poremsky]

instructions from Repair a large Outlook Personal Folders File (over 2GB) - Slipstick Systems

Make a backup of your PST or OST, then open the original file with the hex editor (available for download from any Windows shareware site). You’ll want to remove a few characters from the middle of the file, then save it and try to run the Inbox Repair Tool (Scanpst.exe) to repair the damage you did with the hex editor. If Scanpst can repair the file, you should be able to open it Outlook again. If not, try removing some additional characters from the file.

 

[juicejam]

Ok, I tried the PST2GB.exe utility. This is supposed to truncate a large file etc. On selection of my PST file, I get the following error message: This is not a valid .PST file.

I am wondering if there is something wrong with the file structure/extension etc? when I run scanpst at least it takes a few seconds to say that it cant recognise the file. PST2GB's response is almost instantaneous.

Any views? Please...

 

[Diane Poremsky]

pst2gb is for ansi pst. You probably have the new Unicode pst. You'll need to use a hex editor to corrupt it and see if scanpst can fix it.

 

[juicejam]

pst2gb is for ansi pst. You probably have the new Unicode pst. You'll need to use a hex editor to corrupt it and see if scanpst can fix it.

i see. when i open the file in hex editor all I see are zeroes!! what do i do with those?

 

[Diane Poremsky]

if the entire file is zeros, it's beyond hope. It should have some garbage characters - typical binary junk - throughout the file.

 

[ejp]

I have similar problem with Outlook 2010 but scanpst.exe won't run. says missing dll. I can't find a download for scanpst. where can I find it? hope I don't have to do an outlook reinstall. I inadvertently am using the old 2003 style pst, so get msg the pst is too big but it won't let me delete anything either. any suggestions on how I can get it to let me delete email?

Once or if I recover, is there a way to convert my old pst to the newer format?

thanks

 

[Diane Poremsky]

If the pst is the new Unicode format so no need to convert it. Scanpst is not available for download - did you try using repair? Go to Control panel, find Add and Remove programs and run repair.

 

[Diane Poremsky]

Oh, and here is the instructions if you need to convert ansi pst to Unicode. How to convert ansi pst to Unicode.

 

[ejp]

Oh, and here is the instructions if you need to convert ansi pst to Unicode. How to convert ansi pst to Unicode.

Thanks, for the info on importing to a new pst. I have the old ansi format (but in a relatively new profile in Outlook 2010. No idea how that happened) and found a way to repairit but forget what I did last week (gone fishing for 4 days, so my brain did a reset).

I'll create a new profile and do an import. That should inoculate me against future problems.

 

[wassman]

There might be some "black box" tools that could recover the file but if you are seeing zero's in the hex editor, I would say the chance of recovery is very grim.