You can't stop it, but you can postpone it. IMHO, let it do its thing. It's
not an issue of space on your HDD, but rather the space and vulnerability of
your dbx files.

You will see that prompt after 100 closings of OE. To put it off, and this
is not my best advice:

Go to: StartRunRegeditOK and find this key.

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Identities\{GUID for Identity
\Software\Microsoft\Outlook Express\5.0. In the right hand pane and find
*Compact Check Count* and set the value to 0, (zero).

*************************************************

Compacting does not remove message, just the space that deleted messages
takes up. Read on.

Why does OE insist on compacting folders when I close it?:
http://www.insideoe.com/faqs/why.htm#compact

Compacting your folders periodically is a must to keep OE functioning well
and at some point, you may lose all your saved messages if you don't. When
you delete messages, they are only marked for deletion and the space they
had used, remains until you compact, or the space is eventually overwritten.

See:
www.oehelp.com/OETips.aspx#2

With SP2, automatic background compacting was removed due to problems it
caused. Now you will get a prompt to compact after 100 OE closings, which
you should do and don't touch anything until it has finished. See this for
more information:
http://www.insideoe.com/files/maintain.htm#compact

To keep things running smooth, and for faster compacting:

Do not archive mail in default OE folders. They will eventually become
corrupt and you may lose mail. Create your own user defined folders for
storing mail and move your mail to them. Empty Deleted Items folder
regularly. Keep user created folders under 100MB, and Default folders as
empty as is feasible.

If you haven't already done so, download this patch. It isn't available at
Windows Updates yet, but you can get it now.

Patch KB918766:
http://tinyurl.com/mx3r2

This patch addresses some of the issues that were caused by KB911567.

Address Book problems.
Unsent templates appearing as sent.
Manually compacting will now reset the registry counter to Zero in WinXP/SP2
and also sends a copy of your dbx files to the recycle bin as a temporary
backup.

To complete the fix for .eml templates, a registry change is needed. See:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/918766

Tom Koch also has this information at his site, along with a downloadable
Zip file to do the registry change for you. See:
http://www.insideoe.com/#kb918651

And backup often.

Backup and Resto

http://www.insideoutlookexpress.com/backup/

http://www.oehelp.com/backup.aspx

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

"Walter Seaton" wrote in message
...
I have just installed a new large capacity hard drive and reinstalled
Windows
XP and installed SP2 (previously I had only SP1). Whenever I log off
Outlook
Express I get a window asking me if I want to compress my files to save
disc
space. I don't need to do that (I have over 600 Gb installed).

How can I prevent this window from opening everytime I log off OE?

Thank you.