How to Repair Corrupt Oversized PST Files

PST or Personal Storage Table is data container of MS Outlook that stores emails, attachments, contact lists and other data of user mailbox. Microsoft has set specific storage limit of PST file with different versions of MS Outlook. Old Outlook versions such as MS Outlook 97, 98, 2000 and 2002 can store mailbox data up to 2 GB in a single PST file. Whenever PST file of MS Outlook 2002 or earlier versions reaches or surpasses 2 GB storage limit, it starts showing error messages.

Corruption errors of oversized PST files

Oversized PST files prevent Outlook users from accessing their mailbox folders. When PST files crosses 2 GB storage capacity or other limits of MS Outlook, it shows different error messages as below:

• Errors have been detected in Outlook.PST file. Quit all mail-enabled applications and run Inbox Repair Tool
  

  
• Outlook.PST cannot be accessed
  

  
• xxxx.PST cannot be accessed - 0x80040116
• The file xxxx.PST has reached its maximum size. To reduce the amount of data in this file, select some items that you no longer need, then permanently (Shift + Del) delete them

Inbuilt options of PST File Repair

Microsoft has added inbuilt tool scanpst.exe in MS Outlook to deal with various corruption issues of PST files including 2 GB storage cap of Outlook. Scanpst.exe resides in the MS Office folder of your system drive. MS Outlook versions store inbox repair tool in different locations of Windows drive:

If you’re using MS Outlook 2002 and Windows XP, the location of scanpst.exe file will be:

• C:\Program Files\Common Files\System\MAPI\<locale ID>\NT\scanpst.exe

If you use Outlook 2010 and Windows XP, the scanpst.exe will be located in

• C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office14

You can start repairing oversized PST files with Scanpst utility in following steps:

• Click on icon of scanpst.exe application

• In the application tray, click on browse button to select oversized PST file from specific location
  
• Press start button to check selected file for errors
• You will see an option “ Make Backup of scanned file before repairing”
  

  
• Select specific system location for the backup file
• Then press “repair” button

You must copy recovered mailbox folders in a new PST file to access old data of your Outlook Profile. However, there is possibility of data loss while repairing an oversized PST file with scanpst tool.

If you are using Outlook 2002 or older version then it is possible to convert your mailbox into

higher version such as MS Outlook 2003 or above. You can move corrupt Outlook.PST file from Outlook 2002 to Outlook 2007 profile in following steps:

• Copy corrupt Outlook.PST file at another location
• Uninstall MS Office 2002 application
• Install MS Office 2007 application
• Create a new user profile with MS Outlook 2007
  

  
• Open your new Outlook profile
  

  
• In the file menu, click on Import and Export
• From the available options, select “Import from another program or file” and click “Next”
  

  
• Select “Personal Folder File (.PST)” from the list and press “Next”
  

  
• Click “Browse” to select the copied Outlook.PST file
  

  
• Choose option “Do not import duplicates” and press” Next”
  

  
• Click “Finish” to complete the process
  

  

MS Outlook 2003 or higher versions store mailbox data more than 2 GB in a single PST file. However, if oversized PST files are still unmanageable with inbuilt options, you are required to select an external email recovery program.

PST File Repair Software

PST file repair is a versatile tool to fix PST files corruption issues including 2 GB size limitation. It successfully extracts emails, attachments, contacts, journals, tasks and other data from corrupt PST file and restore in a new Outlook data file.

PST file repair completely maintains text formatting and order of Outlook data in recovered files. It can also recover permanently deleted, compressed or highly encrypted emails from corrupt PST files. All key features of PST file repair can be assessed in evaluation version. However, you shall be able to save recovered mailbox data only with the licensed version of PST File repair utility. If you often face the problem of pst file corruption due to oversize then you can also manage oversized or large sized pst file. Just follow this link :  http://www.pstfix.com/blog/how-to-reduce-the-size-of-outlook-mailbox