Disappearing e-mails

[Wayne Ek]

When I open Outlook Express I will get a message- Receiving 1 0f 5 new messages, Or 1 of 1 new messages. The problem is if it says 1 of 3, only one new message will show up or if it says 1 of 9 only six new messages appear. Any ideas whats up or a cure?

[Scott K]

They are probably going into a junk mail box.

[Nate McVey]

Yup, check your junk box and if they are in there and they're not supposed to be, loosen up your filters so they show up in your inbox.

[upnorth]

Yup junk folders are probably the culprit.

[DTro]

Believe it or not, my wife and I both have had the same problem pop up recently. We tried everything short of reinstalling outlook.

Its very frustrating, as they pop up, you see them, then they are gone, they just vanish. Tried spam, hidden folder etc. In the end I just quit using Outlook and converted to GMail (almost solely because of that issue). I was losing important emails and it was not good.

[MN Mike]

Outlook Express by itself does not have a spam folder in it unless you run something like Norton, McAfee or some program like that, then one of those programs could put one in your list of mail folders.

If they are not there, double check to make sure you haven't setup some kind of rule that would move them to a deleted folder ( filtering off of a keyword ) or flat out delete the email as soon as it came in.

One last item and it's one that I would be willing to bet is the issue here, Outlook Express folders can become corrupted and exhibit the behavior that you guys have been seeing. I've seen it a few times and it's a head scratcher.......

What you need to do is find the outlook express folder on your system, normally stored under your documents and settings profile but it is buried a little ways. First make sure you are closed out of Outlook Express, navigate to your Outlook Express folder and rename it ( outlook express old or something like that ). Go back and open Outlook Express, the program will automatically recreate a new Outlook Express folder with new EMPTY mail folders. After that has been done, import your mailboxes ( from within the Outlook Express program ) one at a time from the renamed Outlook Express folder ( outlook express old ), my bet is that those emails that have gone missing will show up, every single one...... I've had to do this a few times and it's always worked.

Mike

[upnorth]

There are a few other options out there for email clients too. Windows Live Mail, and Mozilla Thunderbird.

I have never been an Outlook express user myself.

[GatorBait]

Yep, simpliest thing to do is use a different email program (Gmail, Thunderbird, etc..) I've used Gmail since the day it went live and have never had a issue to report. Outlook on the other hand made me want to smash my pc into billions of unfixable parts.

MN Mike shares a good fix to your problem, I'm just trying to help you relieve your email stress to a very calm state.