Retrieving outlook 2000 mail messages in Windows 98

[MartinSmith]

I ran an abortive install of Office 2000 on my Windows 98 machine today and have been unable to get past the login screen since (it's wingeing about the comctl32.dll file).

I will obviously try and replace this file but if the worst comes to the worst and I don't manage to get the OS fixed then the only info I really need and don't have backed up is the mail in my inbox and sent items.

Is there a folder somwhere with loads of *.msg files that I can copy over at the dos prompt (and if so where) or does outlook store them in a much more fiendish way than that (and if so how)?

[kleinma]

well first off you wont get much help in the chit chat forum...

but you may be SOL..

anyways... outlook stores all your emails in a PST files.. and i have heard successful and unsuccessful stories from people about importing old messages into a new version of OL

[MartinSmith]

Doh!

That's me buggered then I imagine my *.pst file must be pretty huge (I assume that it just uses one per folder or something like that does it?).

As the only backup utility I possess is floppies it looks like my only real solution is going to be get the OS working again if I want to retrieve these then?

[kleinma]

possibly..

well i think it stores the actual messages in the PST file.. but things like attachments are stored in some temp folder... so the PST file isn't too huge.. because it is only holding text...

for example mine here at work is 11 megs.. and i have hundreds and hundres of messages in my email (reminds me i gotta clean that out)

but it is just 1 file for all messages.. not 1 per folder...

[MartinSmith]

Cheers for your help. I guess that it will be character building (or something like that...) to fix the OS rather than just relying on that ever so handy restore disk my PC came with!

I just hope that it hasn't messed up too many more files or it could be a late night!