Microsoft releases major Office update

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It's in the .PST file (Pretty ****** Technology)

I avoided switching to Outlook for years, because Outlook Express always seemed to have better features.

Then the big, beautiful, feature-rich, Outlook 2003 came along & I took the plunge.

WHAT A BIG MISTAKE... With over 5,000 e-mails coming in each day, mostly spam & the fact that I saved most e-mails since 1996, the CLUNKY Outlook 2003 immediately CHOKED on the newly created 7GB + .PST File which I eventually had to cull down to under 2GB by archiving & by using a variety of utilities which are only made for Outlook & not Outlook Express.

As an example, downloading 1000 e-mails into Outlook Express takes about 10 minutes on my cable connection. The same number of e-mails takes HOURS to download into Outlook 2003. Plus, if Outlook hiccups,(and it frequently does) it starts all over again from the beginning. This is even after bringing the .PST down below 2GB.

Why? It's the .PST file,(which should stand for Pretty ****** Technology)getting too big.

Let me explain is Simple Terms... Outlook Express has a more efficient way of organization.

Every folder you create is stored in a separate, small,(compared to Outlook)& managable .dbx file, if you remember to create your folders OUTSIDE of your Inbox, by making them sub-folders of "Local Folders" INSTEAD OF sub-folders of the Inbox.

If the Outlook Express Inbox file gets too big, if I remember correctly, 2GB, you'll have problems. I recommend moving everything over 30 days old to another folder, to keep it way below 2GB.

On the other hand, OUTLOOK PUTS EVERYTHING INTO ONE BIG ELEPHANT OF A FILE, with no way to break your data into smaller files, except for frequently archiving older e-mails into an archive.PST which quickly gets too big.

Remember the joke - "How do you eat an elephant?"
Answer: "One bite at a time".

Outlook insists on eating the whole elephant at once, by putting everything into one big file instead of dozens of smaller ones.

But the major problem is this... Outlook insists on putting the entire 2GB or more file & the archive.pst into RAM & the paging file & has to sort through the ENTIRE FILE for every operation or screen change.

Unless you absolutely have to use Outlook instead of Outlook Express because of some Microsoft brainwashed - influenced corporate edict at your company, I recommend switching back to Outlook Express & using a different contact manager.

Even Microsoft admits that the .PST was not designed for high volume e-mail & companies should use Microsoft Exchange on company e-mail servers. So individuals who get a high volume of e-mail, including spam, are out of luck.

I'll try Outlook 2004, 2005,2006.... ONLY IF MICROSOFT DOES AWAY WITH THE DASTARDLY .PST FILE.

Posted by: awhinden   Posted on: 08/02/04 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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