asked on

How does Outlook 2003 know what mail has been downloaded

I synchronise my outlook between my laptop and desktop using a file transfer program.

However once synced to laptop (or visa cersa) when on the move I check mail and it downloads all the mails that it has not personally downloaded already, thus producing duplicates.

There must be a file, setting or registry command that tells Outlook what email has already been downloaded.

So what is it?

TIA

ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION

war1

membership

This solution is only available to members.

To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.

Start Free Trial

warrenbuckles

Check your account settings in Outlook - there is an 'advanced' tab in the settings dialog for each individual account. In the 'Advanced' category you should find a check box that reads 'leave a copy of messages on server.' If that is checked the messages aren't taken off the server when you check e-mail, so un-checking it will resolve your double-message problem. However, when you go back to your desktop machine the e-mails you downloaded to your laptop won't be on it until you re-synchronize the Outlook database files (the .pst files).

wb

Damester

ASKER

thanks for reply warrenbuckles but not the answer

I do have these ticked but that is how I like it, without that ticked I can't use webmail or retrieve missing messages if it ever occured.

There must be a way of outlook knowing what it has and has not downloaded

war1

Damester,

Because of the way you sync your emails, you will get duplicates. You can disable the sync, or you can use the duplicate remover that I proposed.

mrhuge

I have the same question/problem as the original poster. Does anyone know the answer to the question in the title of his post? ie How does Outlook 2003 know which messages it has downloaded already? Through a google search I have found a couple of references to that information being stored "in the profile", but I'm not sure exactly what that means or whether it points to a solution.

Like the original poster, I *don't* want to uncheck the "leave messages on the server" box. I just want my laptop and my desktop to have the same idea of which messages have been downloaded, so that when I transfer my .PST file back and forth I don't get hundreds of duplicate messages. This information has to be stored somewhere - it's hard for me to accept that there's no way to transfer it from ome machine to another.

Any further ideas?

Damester

ASKER

I never found a real answer, suprising for the industry standard email program.
You'd think there would be more support or knowledege.

I now use duplicate email remover and SYNCING.NET for Outlook
It's an expensive solution and I still need to do some administration but my emails stay synced and tidy