Outlook 2000 and compact PST

  • Thread starter Thread starter Brian Smither
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B

Brian Smither

I have Outlook 2000 running in Internet Connection Only mode on Windows
2KServer/SP2. The machine is a four year old HP Pavilion - not blazing fast
by any stretch of the imagination but it gets the job done for which it was
put in service. The PST file is 1.4GB (huge!).

Two days ago, this PST file "lost" between 500 and 1000 Contact entries. I
made a copy of the PST file for recovery efforts. Ontrack couldn't find
them. So I decided to experiment.

I manually have Outlook compact the PST file. For 1.4GB, it takes 1.5
seconds. It may have been compacted as a background process earlier. Still,
does 1.5 seconds for 1.4GB sound right to you?
 
It depends not so much on the size but more on the "white spaces" in the
file. In other words;
The difference between the size mentioned in Outlook against the size you
see in Explorer. If this is a big difference compacting would take a lot
longer.

--
Roady [MVP]
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address when mailing)
 
You said "white spaces" which could mean contiguous slots in the index
marked as "available." If that's the case, then scanning just the index in
1.5 seconds is realistic. That is, if the index also stores the object's
size. We all know that the actual contents aren't written over until a
compaction takes place. Is that what you are saying?
 
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