Complete Way to Repair A Corrupted/Damaged PST File | DataRecovo

If you are using MS Outlook email client for such a long time then you’ve probably known about some error messages and corruptions issues while accessing Outlook data file.

Sometimes you got the error message “The Outlook data file didn’t close properly” after this message you have to wait for a few moments as this error message is a minor issue so that you can get the preview of your emails by just restating the Outlook application.

But the luck is not that good every time as sometimes PST file got severely damaged or corrupt that Outlook refuses to open the PST file, every time you have tried to access it. At such situation, you can try to fix the damaged file with some free or third-party tools. Considering data corruption in MS Outlook can be done by various multiple reasons, you may need to try a couple of different methods in order to fix the corrupted file.

Method 1: Inbox Repair Tool

It is a simple, great and free tool to repair the Outlook data file. It is an inbuilt utility which comes with Outlook installation. This tool basically tries to repair the PST file and delete anything from the file that this tool can’t able to recognize.

Location of this tool: C:\Program Files (x86) \Microsoft Office\root\Office(version)

You can also go to the file location of Outlook application by simply performing a normal windows search. 

• After getting the location of the tool simply run the tool.
• Now click on browse and choose the corrupted PST File.
• After selecting the file, click on start to start the process.
• When the process is done, it will show you the errors that is found by this tool.
• Now choose your backup location and click on repair to repair the file.
• After the repairing process, Open Outlook and check if your inbox back to normal or not. If not then repeat the process again. Sometimes you need to run scanpst.exe multiple times in order to fix all errors in PST file to go away.
   
• Apart from PST file, this tool also works in OST file which is an Offline exchange server folder that helps Outlook users to work offline.

Method 2: Truncate Oversize PST File

Another reason why the PST file becomes corrupted is due to the file size limit for Outlook. File size for Outlook data files is 2 Gb and when the user goes over this limit, Outlook starts working abnormally and the entire file becomes corrupt. This type of error happens only to the older version of MS Outlook. The new version of MS Outlook comes with 20-50 Gb of file size limit.

For the purpose to fix the issue, you have to truncate or trim the PST file in order to decrease the file size below 2 GB. Sadly, you need to download and use a tool from Microsoft which is “Oversized PST and OST crop tool” This tool will delete 25-50 MB of your data which can be important. So, use this tool considering as last option.

In order to get this tool, you need to call Microsoft helpline

Method 3: Use Third-Party PST Repair Tool

If the above methods don’t work or respond to corruption, you can try a third-party application called PST Recovery Software that is powerful enough to save every bit of file and recover all of your emails seamlessly without any hassle.

This software comes with paid as well as the free version. With the help of paid licensed version there is no limitation to recover as you can recover multiple folders at the same time and also you can save data from password protected files also and can able to repair oversized PST file also.

With the free version, you can only save up to 25 emails per folder at the same.