Suddenly lost all my emails in Windows Live Mail

Anonymous
2012-03-01T12:17:58+00:00

Question Summary

Other Windows Live Mail issues

Please provide your impacted Email address :

elaine_******@ntlworld.com

Did you receive an error code or message?

No

Please enter the error code or message you received

None

Which version of Windows Live Mail are you using ?

Version 2011 (15.4.3538.513)

Choose your Operating System version :

Windows 7

Additional Details

Opened Windows Live Mail yesterday afternoon and all my emails had 'disappeared'.  My Calendar, Feeds and Contacts were all in place.  I had not deleted anything.

I looked in the Recycle bin and found a huge 20mb (ish) file called 'MSMESSAGESTORE' which I restored although, at the time it told me the file already existed so it recovered it to a secondary location.

Now if I search for '.eml' files I find some or all of the emails under

C:\Users...........\Windows Live Mail\Storage(1)\Recovered items..............

I do not have a Hotmail account.

Please help me recover these emails.

Thank you.

Windows for home | Other | Email and communications

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

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Answer accepted by question author
Anonymous
2012-03-08T13:26:13+00:00

It seems that the moderators that responded do not understand the WLMail maintenance procedure and do not understand what it means to not have a Hotmail account.

[quote user=Maudestan]The only thing that happened was that as I 'Shut Down' the PC the message 'Recovering unused disk space' came up which happens every few weeks.[/quote]

When WLMail closes some housekeeping is performed.  You should always close WLMail several minutes before turning off the computer.

After 100 closes, unused disk space is recovered.  You can change the setting by going to Alt, F, O, M, Advanced tab, Maintenance button, ..........

I am not clear on the maintenance procedure.

My guess is that a copy of 'MSMESSAGESTORE' is placed in the recycle bin and 'MSMESSAGESTORE' is rebuilt.   The rebuilding process was stopped which created your problem.

Follow this procedure and see if you have recovered all of your emails.

1. You will first need to select the Show hidden files option.

a. Open Windows Explorer and click Organize / Folder and search options. Click the View Tab.

b. Place a check mark in the Show Hidden files, folders and drives option.

Click Apply/OK.

c. Close and restart Windows Explorer.

2. Open the WLM Store folder.

a. Navigate to the following folder.

C:\Users\your name\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail

(Where 'your name' is the name of the account that you use to logon to Windows 7)

b. In this folder you will see all of the WLM storage folders. Each email account will have its own group of folders.

c. Any general storage folders that you created will under the main Storage Folders item.

3. Make a copy of the Windows Live Mail folders previous version.****

a. Right clickthe Windows Live Mail folder and select Properties / Previous Versions Tab.

b. After the list populates, select a version of the folder with a date and time prior to when the folders were deleted.

c. Click the Copy Button. In the Copy dialog box, select the Desktop as the location to place the copied folder.

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  1. Anonymous
    2015-08-06T22:34:36+00:00

    Quick fix by following these steps - will recover lost mail but overwrites current mail - assuming that the Recycle Bin has a file named Mail.MSMessageStore:

    1. in Windows Live Mail read your current mail because you will lose it when next steps are executed
    2. Close Live Mail
    3. Navigate to the Windows Live Mail folder and look for the file "Mail.MSMessageStore".  Path is: C:/ - Users - <your user name> - AppData (a hidden file you must and changed "view" to show hidden files) - Local - Microsoft - Windows Live Mail
    4. Rename the Mail.MSMessageStore file
    5. Restore or copy the Mail.MSMessageStore file from the Recycle bin

    For safety / backup you can also copy the  current Mail.MSMessageStore file to a folder in your MyDocuments as well as the file from the Recycle Bin. 

    Note: for some reason the current file that your are renaming still has Contacts and other information just not the mail.....

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  2. Anonymous
    2015-01-16T06:48:53+00:00

    it worked...show all folder and then i coud see all my folder.

    then later used options from my windows mail account (outlook express), and all mails back.

    however they were imported in new folders so had to move them to the correct folders back..

    but still v. v. help full had about 80k plus mails to be revived.

    thanks appreciate your point and more importantly sharing it.

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  3. Anonymous
    2014-11-19T04:19:52+00:00

    Hello Tom,

    Welcome to Microsoft Community Forum. I understand that you're having the same issue as the first poster and would like to stop Windows Live Mail restoring disk space. Since you cannot find the maintenance button, it is possible that the issue is caused by a corrupted data within your Windows Live Mail. For this issue, please try to repair your Live Mail by following the steps below:

    For Windows 8:

    1. Click the Windows button on your keyboard.
    2. Type Control Panel and hit Enter.
    3. Click Programs.
    4. Click Programs and Features.
    5. Search for Windows Essentials 2012 on the list and then select it.
    6. Click Uninstall/Change.
    7. Click Repair all Windows Essentials programs.

    For Windows Vista/7:

    1. Click the Start menu.
    2. Click Control Panel.
    3. Click Programs.
    4. Click Programs and Features.
    5. Search for Windows Essentials 2012 on the list and then select it.
    6. Click Uninstall/Change.
    7. Click Repair all Windows Essentials programs.

    Let us know the results afterwards.

    Thank you.

    Got this error message

    Repairs didn't go smoothly... weren't able to Repair Windows Essentials

    Couldn't install programs.  couldn't repair: Mail, Photo Gallery and Movie Maker

    an unknown error occurred.

    Error: 0x800c0006

    Source: crt110-i386

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  4. Anonymous
    2014-08-09T08:28:15+00:00

    Hello Tom,

    Welcome to Microsoft Community Forum. I understand that you're having the same issue as the first poster and would like to stop Windows Live Mail restoring disk space. Since you cannot find the maintenance button, it is possible that the issue is caused by a corrupted data within your Windows Live Mail. For this issue, please try to repair your Live Mail by following the steps below:

    For Windows 8:

    1. Click the Windows button on your keyboard.
    2. Type Control Panel and hit Enter.
    3. Click Programs.
    4. Click Programs and Features.
    5. Search for Windows Essentials 2012 on the list and then select it.
    6. Click Uninstall/Change.
    7. Click Repair all Windows Essentials programs.

    For Windows Vista/7:

    1. Click the Start menu.
    2. Click Control Panel.
    3. Click Programs.
    4. Click Programs and Features.
    5. Search for Windows Essentials 2012 on the list and then select it.
    6. Click Uninstall/Change.
    7. Click Repair all Windows Essentials programs.

    Let us know the results afterwards.

    Thank you.

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