Need to extract contacts and messeges from an old installation

[John]

I have an old laptop here that's running Windows NT 4.0, and it recently got
corrupted somehow, and I reinstalled WinNT. All the files for Office are
still there, including Outlook, but I cant run outlook to export the
messages and contacts (it says Office needs to be installed). I need to know
two things: 1) Is there any way to extract the data from the existing files,
or 2) Can I install Outlook again to the same directory without over-writing
the existing contacts and messages, and have the new Outlook recognize them?

Thanks a lot for any help,
- John

 

[Russ Valentine [MVP-Outlook]]

Unless you were running against Exchange Server, all Outlook data is stored
in a Personal Folders file (*.pst)
Take a look at these pages for info on Outlook data backup:
http://www.slipstick.com/config/backup.htm
http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q168/6/44.asp
http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q181/0/14.asp
http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q184/8/17.asp