You could create a new identity in OE for the sole purpose of archiving. You
should also keep user created folders 100MB or less to avoid corruption.

In your situation, archiving to a CD may be preferable.

Create a folder on your Desktop, then in Outlook Express open the folder
with the messages you want to save. Highlight one message, then Ctrl+A will
highlight them all, (or hold the Ctrl button down while you select only the
messages you want), Now, drag and drop them to the folder on your Desktop.
(Easiest if the folder shortcut is on the Taskbar).

Now you can copy that folder to a CD and you will be able to read the
messages on the CD by double-clicking on them.

The downside of this is that messages that have the same subject will be
overwritten. To avoid this, purchase:

DBXtract:
http://www.oehelp.com/DBXtract/Default.aspx
--
Bruce Hagen
MS MVP - Outlook Express
~IB-CA~


"JJ Sugarbear" wrote in message
...
Hi,

I have a several years (read several Gigabytes) backlog of OE messages
that I've now moved out of my main mail folder, ready for backup.

My question is: how can I archive these, preferably into a single file
(such as Outlook PST, for example) that I can occasionally access and
search if I need, without having to import them back into OE? It would be
nice if the format is common enough that it won't be impossible to access
the file in ten years - like so many proprietary systems.

Thanks,

JoJo