Just spent about six hours over two days trying to fix a problem with Outlook Express. It couldn't open the Address Book. And since it seems to do that when you try to open a screen to create mail, I couldn't send any mail.
Unquestionably my fault -- deleted some registry keys without backing up the registry first. Dumb, stupid, criminal, I know.
Restoring the registry keys did no good.
System Restore was as non-helpful as usual.
Did a reinstall of XP -- what they call an 'upgrade', though I don't know why. It was the recommended action (the other being, install from scratch, I guess). Course, that was a hardcoded recommendation on the page -- ie, it didn't ask anything, it just recommended it. Like a sleazy used-car salesman or insurance pusher. Didn't work. Did pop up with some new annoying things, but maybe they were there when I first installed ZP. Got rid of the ones that I could.
Created another ID for the pc, tried using that. Looked promising. Outlook could open the (empty) address book but it couldn't import the address book from the original ID. Pointed it to the folder where it was, and the display didn't show it. Dammit, I know it's there -- File Mangler shows it! (Excuse me, Explorer. Ahem. ) I copied the file to the Temp directory, and then Outlook could see and import it. Ah, progress. But I couldn't get that identity to import my folders. Though, with the gibberish string that MSoft uses to identify the ID, down in the Identities section, I couldn't even be sure I was trying to import the right old ID folders, anyway.
I said ah, crap (and other things), I'll do the install from scratch. Deleted the new id...and suddenly, Outlook with the old ID works. Well, mostly. Now, when I switch from ID to ID, it either a) only goes to the id that's listed in Manage Identitites as the one to use when starting a program, or b) if that box is unchecked, it glibly says hey, I don't know who you are -- so select your id again.
But it works. I can send mail, open the address book.
I can't hardly wait to see how this PC acts with SuckerPunch2 installed, though. Or how many 'improvements' Msoft slipped in there.
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Update: I displayed the Registry Keys, and exported them. That was apparently enough to fug up Outlook. Can't open the AB again.
Joy does not adequately express my feeling.
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Update: Poked around, deleted some programs, got an alert from XP that an update had arrived (I keep expecting SuckerPunch2 to show up via FedEx, carried in by a burly guy who's knees are giving out from the weight of the code). Updated, rebooted, and now oe kinda-works again. This must be what it's like to live on the slopes of Vesuvius. Was that thunder?
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