Why it happens:

http://insideoe.tomsterdam.com/probl...s.htm#mailgone
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/IE/...orruption.mspx

Recovering data: http://www.oehelp.com/OETips.aspx#4
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
DBXtract
http://www.oehelp.com/DBXtract/Default.aspx

DBXtend (additional functionality)
http://www.oehelp.com/DBXtend/Default.aspx

DBXpress (faster, more powerful, with even greater functionality)
http://www.oehelp.com/DBXpress/Default.aspx

OEX (OE Enhancement Program)
http://www.oehelp.com/OEX/Default.aspx
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Avoid Such Corruption in Futu

- Don't use Inbox or Sent Items to archive messages. Move them to local
folders created for this purpose.

- Empty Deleted Items folder daily.

- Disable Background Compacting [N/A in SP2] and frequently perform a manual
compact of all OE folders while "working offline". More at
http://insideoe.tomsterdam.com/files/maintain.htm.

- WinXP SP2 only: Do not shut down your machine while Windows is
automatically compacting your message store.

- Your anti-virus application's email scanning feature can also cause such
corruption. Disable it. It provides no additional protection.

--
~Robear Dyer (PA Bear)
MS MVP-Windows (IE/OE, Shell/User, Security), Aumha.org VSOP, DTS-L.org

David McGoldrick wrote:
Last night (1/29/06) OE asked if I wanted to compact my messages to free
up space. I allowed it to and it took 1-1.5 hours. Today, every message
in my Inbox from 12/13/05 - 1/29/06 is gone, deleted, not be found
anywhere on my computer. Microsoft Service tells me that OE's compaction
process randomly deletes emails.

This is not compaction, this is deletion. Any idiot can delete their own
emails when they choose to do so. Microsoft tells me that they know that
the random deletion is a problem and that the research department has been
working on this for some time. This is totally unbelievable. I can't
believe that Microsoft hasn't issed a service pack to disable the
compaction process if what happened to me is even possible they KNEW it.

The customer help department called it random deletion. In reality it was
every email that I had received (and not previously deleted) for the past
1.5 months.