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Outlook Express

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by miklv

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I've been trying to help my brother with his OE which doesn't want to receive email. It sends just fine but won't receive anything. He is running XP Pro and I have tried doing the "uninstall", as it's called with no luck at all. This is the one where you change the registry values and then reinstall either IE or OE. I've reinstalled both of them and then put Office XP Pro on for him yesterday with the thought he could now switch to Outlook for mail. That didn't work either and I received an error message saying Outlook Express had to be installed first. It is already installed. The other bizarre thing that happens every time is while trying to download IE for reinstallation the download goes so far and then just freezes, not downloading anything more. He has a cable connection so being booted isn't a problem. We've left this download sit like this overnight and it still won't download everything. I was able to complete the download once and that was after I did the registry changes. He's getting frustrated having to login into the ISP website just to check his email. Suggestions??

7 replies

by doronamir

Dear Sir,

to uninstall IE and/or OE, you should go to "Add/Remove programs" in your control panel. than, choose the "Add/Remove Windows Components" button on the left. At the "Windows Components" window (which just opened), uncheck IE and/or OE and press next.
after the changes, restart the computer, and then go through the process again, this time re-checking the items, in order to reinstall them.
This would probably help you with your problems. if not, i'll be more than glad to suggest further help.

by shasca

It sounds like you have O.E. working again? If that is the case, recheck your pop3, and smtp server names given to you by your ISP. There could be a typo in POP3(incoming)settings.

by miklv

This reply is also very good, but doesn't solve this problem for me. OE has always "worked", but only for sending mail and not receiving it, which I find totally baffling. I can sit there sending message after message to his email account and they'll show in the Sent folder as they should, but when I either wait for the mail to be received or click on the Send/Receive button it appears to work but yet nothing happens as far as mail being received by OE. The other really bizarre part of this is with the installation and use of Outlook, because when it starts it says Outlook Express has to be installed first. How do you tell a computer the program is already there and all it has to do is look? LOL!!

by holdenburg

Hi...
What is he using for Virus software. Trend Micro and other Virus Software will rename the POP3 to "Localhost" which sometimes prevents the client from seeing the POP3 server...

Good luck....

Herb

by miklv

Good reply; however i know it isn't that. I know all too well how Norton, which is what he's using, is notoroious for doing exactly what you describe, and is almost always one of the first things I check anymore when there are email problems with OE.

by holdenburg

Ok... I had to go for the "quick and dirty" but re-reading your issue, I have had a similar issue. By chance did your brother install the Office Beta version and then try to install Office XP?. There is a similar issue with this. Also, you say you re-installed MS IE 6? Is this with the service pak??

Good luck...
Herb

by holdenburg

And.... It sounds like the first solution has some relavent troubleshooting. The POP3 is a mystery unless his ISP changed the schema for the actual name of the mail server. This sounds like the mapi is damaged on this OS. The first solution should fix it. You will need to figure out why you cannot download the upgrade to IE or why it is stopping when you attempt to run it. I have asked already about the possibliity of the Office11 Beta being installed. There are definite issues with un-installing this and getting the mapi client issues sorted out after re-installing OfficeXP. The other item I would try if you feel you have exhausted all is to go to the registry and delete the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\MICROSOFT\INTERNETEXPLORER folder and try the install again. On tough re-installs this is sometimes the only way to get the re-install to work.

Good luck...

Herb

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