Speaking of computer problems...

[Jazzmoose]

Outlook Express has gone batshit on me. Every time I turn my computer on and open the darn thing, I receive EVERY email I've received from March 31st on. Considering the spam that I get, plus the thirty to forty emails I get from my other non-jazz hobby, this is getting intolerable fast. Any ideas as to what went wrong?

[tjobbe]

you need to configure somehow (assume you use POP-3 as protocal) what has to happen with the mails that reside on the server side.

Check what you'd configured there. Options are normally

a) leave all on server (requires you to delete them on the server)

b) delete after download ( is normally the prefered way)

c) delete after a certain time (is also ok)

what I assume in your case has happened that either the server or OE has not properly managed to flag the already downloaded mails. So it might well be that even your OE is having a corrupt mail file.

Does your provide have a webmail interface you can manually delete your server side emails to avoid the download?

Hope that helps...

Cheers, Tjobbe

[Claude]

you need to configure somehow (assume you use POP-3 as protocal) what has to happen with the mails that reside on the server side.

Check what you'd configured there. Options are normally

a) leave all on server (requires you to delete them on the server)

b) delete after download ( is normally the prefered way)

c) delete after a certain time (is also ok)

In my view c) is best, because it allows to read again through webmail (from a different computer) those mails that you have already downloaded to the main PC. But the time should not be too long, because the mailbox might be filled up if it is small and you receive large attachments. Setting the time to 8 days should not create problems.

With any of the options, Outlook Express should not download emails twice, so there must be something wrong either in Outlook Express or on the mail server, as tjobbe has already indicated

Edited April 8, 2005 by Claude

[tjobbe]

yeah, run e.g. some disc-checker for currupted files etc. maybe that can help as the OE needs to locally flag in his mail-file which mails do not need to get retrieved again. If it cannot update, it assumes all to be new and re-loads and re-loards.....until your disc is full

Cheers, Tjobbe

[neveronfriday]

It very much sounds like that the mail read didn't get flagged properly on the server. In that case, the suggestion above regarding the deletion of files via a browser interface seems to be the way to go.

If it's a problem with Outlook Express (bat shit is virtually synonymous with that programme), it might be an idea to find the folder which stores the OE settings, copy those to a new location (backup) and then delete each and every file. I only work with Outlook (the big brother), but if I do that, Outlook then generates a new set of startup files which should eliminate the problem.

And, if it screws everything up, copy the backed-up files back, and you're back to ... receiving tons of already read mail.

P.S.: I don't know which folder holds those OE files, but googling for OE problems should turn up an answer in any one of the three trillion hits google spews across the screen(s).

[Jazzmoose]

If it's a problem with Outlook Express (bat shit is virtually synonymous with that programme)...

Well, I'm guano keep working on it; thanks for the help...I let you guys know what develops. Strangely enough, today everything worked fine, and I hadn't tried anything yet.