Using Classic Outlook on Windows for personal email, calendar, and contact management
POTENTIAL FIX:
I started to suspect the problem is with an Office 365 update, so last night I downgraded the Office install on 1/4 of our host machines.
This morning, I'm happy to report that all users on the downgraded machine are able to access Outlook without issue, while several users on the machines with the newest version of O365 are still having trouble.
To downgrade, uninstall Office from your host machine and reinstall using the Office Deployment tool.
Here is the working XML configuration for us:
<Configuration>
<Add OfficeClientEdition="64" Channel="Broad" Version="16.0.8431.2270">
<Product ID="O365ProPlusRetail">
<Language ID="en-us" />
</Product>
</Add>
<Updates Enabled="FALSE" />
<Display Level="None" AcceptEULA="TRUE" />
<Property Name="AUTOACTIVATE" Value="1" />
<Property Name="SharedComputerLicensing" Value="1" />
</Configuration>
The command to install is then:
setup /configure config-file.xml
Obviously the <Updates Enabled=FALSE" /> section is critical so that Office won't auto-update itself.
Version 16.0.8431.2270 is quite old, so this isn't a permanent fix as it may open up your environment to security risks. Over the coming days and weeks I'd like to, perhaps with the help of the community, find a newer version of Office that is free from this bug.
Hope this works for everyone. Let me know either way.
-Tom