Fix stuck messages in Windows Mail Outbox
A friend of mine called me the other day. He had troubles with a mail in Windows Mail running Windows Vista 32-bit. The mail was sort of stuck in the outbox of Windows Mail. He was not able to delete or send the email which was very unfortunate for him, as email was used regularly as part of his job.
He was prompted at every exit of Windows Mail that there was unsent mail and he was getting desperate, as he could not figure out what was going on
A quick research revealed that Microsoft actually created a Knowledge Base article describing that exact problem. The article suggests patching Windows Mail to resolve the issue. Mails can be deleted after applying the patch to the system.
The problem seems to occur when the stream entries for the messages are inaccessible before Windows Mail deletes the messages from the Outbox. One possibility would be a notebook running out of battery in this exact moment. If you got stuck messages in the outbox of Windows Mail download the patch and delete the messages afterwards. The patch is available for both the 32-bit and 64-bit version of Windows Vista.
Make sure you exit Windows Live Mail before you run the patch installer, as it may not work otherwise. You need to make sure as well that you download the right patch file that works with your system. If you run a 32-bit version of Vista, download the corresponding file, or download the 64-bit file if you are running a 64-bit version of Windows Vista.
If installing the update does not resolve the issue that you are experiencing, Microsoft suggests to run the following troubleshooting options:
- Locate the Windows Mail message store folder and delete it so that it is rebuild.
- Rebuild the entire Windows Mail folder and create a new folder.
Both methods require some manual work on your part. I highly suggest you try method one first before you try method two.
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You said that Outlook isn’t your main email client, so which is your main one?
I think its thunderbird
It is Mozilla Thunderbird.
Awesome! This actually solved my problem… what a stupid bug.
If this is the same bug that I’ve encountered, there may be another fix: (1) hover over open Outlook item in Taskbar, cursor up to hover over Outlook window item, and right-click; (2) this should give you Restore / Move / Size / Minimize / Maximize — choose Move or Size; (3) use your cursor keys, going arbitrarily N/S/E/W, to try to move or size the Outlook window back into view. Basically, the app behaves as though it were open in a 0x0 window, or at a location that’s offscreen, and this will frequently work to resize and/or move the window. Don’t forget to close while resized/moved, so that Outlook remembers the size/position for next time.
THANK YOU Claude!!! I could get the main window to launch but could not get any other message window to show on the desktop. You are my hero!!!!
Solved my issue! 6 years later and this is still problem…
Fantastic. Thank you. Size did the trick.
This solved my Outlook problem, too. Thank you. :)
Thank you so much, this started happening to me today and was causing big problems. You are a life saver, I hope I can help you in some way some day.
You are a god – thank you!
thanks a lot…. work like charm.. :-)
Yah…thanks Claude. I’ve been having the same problem and tried all the suggestions…your solution was the answer. It had resized itself to a 0/0 box. Cheers
Excellent post. This had me baffled even trying to accurately describe the problem. This fixed it for me.
Thank you
Thanks a lot for the article. Don’t know why it happenend, don’t know how it got fixed, but it was really annoying and now it works :-)
Thanks a lot. I was facing this issue from past 3 week. I tried everything but no resolution. The issue was happening intermittently and mainly when I was changing the display of screen ( as i use 2 monitors). The only option i had was to do system restore. But thanks to you.
I’ve been tried to sole this problem for 12hours. Your comment about changing the display of screen helped me a lot!! Thanks!!
Thank you…don’t know why this happened but your instructions helped me fix it. Running Windows 10 and office pro 2007
Great tip! Thanks!
Worked for me, too – thank you!!!
It’s Worked for me, too
thank you very much!
I had a similar issue with Outlook 2013 on Windows 10 and this helped me to fix it. Thank you very much!
Thank you so much. Solved!
Considering you published this in 2012, incredible not been debugged by Microsoft.
Thank you again. M
This problem was faced by only one user logging to TS 2008 r2 using outlook 2010.The issue was resolved.
Thanks.
Great tip. Thank you!!!! If it helps, I had to use the Control Key and the arrow keys at the same time to bring my window back into view. Worked like a charm.
Thank you, this worked !!!!
Man, you are a fucking god. Thanks a lot, what an annoying bug!!
Awesome, this post solved the issue. Many thanks!