.PST File Size and Personal Folders Size mismatched - Is this norm

[Nash_deVille]

OUTLOOK 2007
VISTA X64 HOME PREMIUM

Folder Size = 1.2GB (see below for how this was determined)*
..PST File Size on disk is 9.6GB
Is this size difference normal?

If this is not normal, should Compact Now balance these sizes to be more
similar?
Compact Now used to take a very long time (days) but after defragmenting, it
now takes a few seconds.
Also, I wanted to try scanpst.exe but could not find it on my Vista 64 system
Again, is this normal?

*Folder Size was determined by Opening Outlook, selecting the top Personal
Folders node in the tree, right clicking properties, clicking Folder Size
button shows a total size including subfolders of 1.2GB

I look forward to your insights!

Thanks,

Nash_deVille

 

[Peter Foldes]

The correct size of the pst is what you have on the C: which is 9.6GB. Ignore that
other one

 

[Diane Poremsky [MVP]]

There will be a different between the file size on the hard drive and the
total folder size as reported in outlook but it shouldn't be that far off
unless you have a lot of hidden messages - this can be views and custom
forms along with a number of other things.

Was that the reading for the Inbox only or all folders in the pst? How many
items are in the pst? Regardless, I'd compact the pst and see if it brings
the size down some. If the pst doesn’t need compacted it will end within
seconds.

What addins do you have installed? some will create hidden messages - I used
one search/.indexing utility and it created hundreds of pointers hidden in
my inbox. You can use OutlookSpy or mbdvu to view the hidden items.

--
Diane Poremsky [MVP - Outlook]



Outlook Tips by email:
mailto:[email protected]

EMO - a weekly newsletter about Outlook and Exchange:
mailto:[email protected]

 

[Roady [MVP]]

As for scanpst.exe, for Outlook 2007 you'll find it in the same installation
directory as outlook.exe.
See http://www.msoutlook.info/question/77

 

[Nash_deVille]

My first thought was the size mismatch (recall that the folder total size was
only 1.2GB while the .pst on disk was 9.6GB) was a symptom of the need to
compact the .pst file. When I did that, compacting happened too fast to be
true. It just seemed fishy to me.

I finally located scanpst.exe, and for those of us who are Vista 64 users,
it's not in the path that applies to nearly everyone else that you see in the
help files. Start looking in Program Files (x86) instead of Program Files.
From there it's the same. (By the way, I still don't understand why
searching in non-indexed locations, including hidden and system files, did
not reveal scanpst.exe to me. It was there.)

Next, I rebooted in selective startup (stripped to only Microsoft services),
then as a test, I created a backup of my main .pst and ran scanpst.exe on it.
Errors were identified, and repaired, which took less than an hour.

Once again, I rebooted in selective startup (stripped to only Microsoft
services), and opened Outlook. Using Data File Management, I added the
backup .pst to the profile, and had a look around. No new folders, such as
lost and found, were created by the scanpst.exe. That was a relief.
Everything looked fine to me, and response time was closer to normal. So, I
checked the file properties and the Folder Size (including all subfolders)
was still about 1.2GB. Next, I proceeded to Compact the backup .pst.
Compacting did not finish in a few seconds - as it did prior to running
scanpst.exe on it - this time it took overnight. When it was done, I had a
look around inside the folders, and everything looked as I expected it to -
just fine - and response times were fast and consistent (no more oddball
lags) once the items loaded. Using the Outlook Backup Tool, I performed a
backup of the newly compacted .pst. Instead of the former 9.6GB, the new
backup indicated it was copying 1.6GB. A massive success in my opinion.

So, if you have a mismatch between the total folder size and the size on
disk of your .pst, AND compacting happens very quickly, run scanpst.exe on
the file. It could be that the compacting routine is skipping to the end
without doing anything in the middle due to errors of some kind.

 

[Nash_deVille]

Answers to Diane's questions are:

Folder Size of 1.2GB was for all folders and subfolders from the very top
node down.

Compacting took only a few seconds, but instead of indicating that
compacting wasn't needed, this turned out to be a symptom of the need to run
scanpst.exe the inbox repair tool to fix errors in the file structure.

In the .pst there are 137 folders and 19,054 items.

Diane mentions elsewhere she prefers views to folders. I suppose I'll have
to learn to use views. The reason I am using folders is to consolidate
messages from senders who have more than one sender ID into one location
where I can see everything from Mr. Jones, no matter what device or email
account he used to originate the message.

Add-ins installed include YouSendIt for sending large files, efax for
sending and receiving faxes via email in PDF format, and Acrobat Professional
for creating those large files.

I had no idea hidden items were even possible in Outlook, which raises a
whole new question. If you don't see any items in the outbox, but
send/receive status when processing all your email accounts says its sending
17 or some other number, and you don't see any change in sent items, would
that mean there is some hidden item sending going on on the system? We might
need to take this to another thread...

Thanks for your help.

There will be a different between the file size on the hard drive and the
total folder size as reported in outlook but it shouldn't be that far off
unless you have a lot of hidden messages - this can be views and custom
forms along with a number of other things.

Was that the reading for the Inbox only or all folders in the pst? How many
items are in the pst? Regardless, I'd compact the pst and see if it brings
the size down some. If the pst doesn’t need compacted it will end within
seconds.

What addins do you have installed? some will create hidden messages - I used
one search/.indexing utility and it created hundreds of pointers hidden in
my inbox. You can use OutlookSpy or mbdvu to view the hidden items.

--
Diane Poremsky [MVP - Outlook]



Outlook Tips by email:
mailto:[email protected]

EMO - a weekly newsletter about Outlook and Exchange:
mailto:[email protected]

OUTLOOK 2007
VISTA X64 HOME PREMIUM

Folder Size = 1.2GB (see below for how this was determined)*
.PST File Size on disk is 9.6GB
Is this size difference normal?

If this is not normal, should Compact Now balance these sizes to be more
similar?
Compact Now used to take a very long time (days) but after defragmenting,
it
now takes a few seconds.
Also, I wanted to try scanpst.exe but could not find it on my Vista 64
system
Again, is this normal?

*Folder Size was determined by Opening Outlook, selecting the top Personal
Folders node in the tree, right clicking properties, clicking Folder Size
button shows a total size including subfolders of 1.2GB

I look forward to your insights!

Thanks,

Nash_deVille

 

[Diane Poremsky [MVP]]

Glad to hear you resolved it. It sounds like the index was corrupt - that
would cause compacting to fail. Scanpst fixed it which allowed compacting to
remove all white space left by deleted messages.

--
Diane Poremsky [MVP - Outlook]



Outlook Tips by email:
mailto:[email protected]

EMO - a weekly newsletter about Outlook and Exchange:
mailto:[email protected]

 

[Brian Tillman [MVP - Outlook]]

OUTLOOK 2007
VISTA X64 HOME PREMIUM

Folder Size = 1.2GB (see below for how this was determined)*
.PST File Size on disk is 9.6GB
Is this size difference normal?

If this is not normal, should Compact Now balance these sizes to be more
similar?
Compact Now used to take a very long time (days) but after defragmenting, it
now takes a few seconds.
Also, I wanted to try scanpst.exe but could not find it on my Vista 64
system
Again, is this normal?

It will be in in either Start>Programs>Microsoft Office>Microsoft Office
Tools>Inbox Repair Tool or Start>Programs>Microsoft Office Tools>Inbox Repair
Tool. The image is C:\Programs Files (x86)\Microsoft
Office\Office12\scanpst.exe

 

[AdamS]

this worked out perfectly. thank you for investing the time to save me time.
I was not as out of whack as yours was, but there was a difference and that
concerned me as to the stability of the outlook file. And when you have
everything invested in that file, you want it to be stable. Even with
back-ups. I was able to knock off 500MB on the file size and now it matches
within a few mb's to the folder size. And everyone take note of the last
entry which tells you exactly how to find the scanpst.exe file or Repair
utility which accesses the same executable file.
cheers, Adam

 

[VanguardLH]

AdamS wrote:

<snipped - no added details to an old thread>

You are replying to an over 2-month old post.