Solve Error – Outlook PST Unreadable & Corrupted Email Messages

  author
Written By Andrew Jackson
Anuraag Singh
Approved By Anuraag Singh
Published On April 23rd, 2024
Reading Time 4 Minutes Reading

Issue Faced by a User

“Hello, I faced a very tricky issue with my MS Outlook 2016 email client data on my system: Unreadable pst file. Till day before, everything was okay, but then, suddenly when I tried to open my MS Outlook email program initially for accessing my mailbox data, I received a message wherein it was asking whether I would want to archive my emails from Inbox folder, to which I clicked no. 

Then, afterward, on receiving a few of the emails, my Outlook application froze all of a sudden. Then, I restarted Outlook again. Afterward, I realized that my Outlook’s PST file exceeded its file size limit and so had gone corrupt due to that. I need suggestions for fixing this error: Outlook PST unreadable. Any help in this regard would be appreciated.”

About MS Outlook Email Client

MS Outlook email client is one of the best emailing companions of many computer users around the globe. This is because this email client is easy to work with, and users can easily manage their mailboxes’ email items on their hard disk drives all by themselves. The user-friendly graphical user interface of Outlook and its wonderful features make users getting used to and kind of addicted to these easy-to-operate email functionalities of MS Outlook both on MS Windows platforms as well as on Mac machines too.

What is Unreadable PST File in Outlook Error

As it is a well-known fact that for Outlook uses personal folders for home users, saving all email data and mailbox items in a file with .pst extension that is also known as the Personal storage table file or the personal folders file. These PST files sometimes behave in an abnormal manner or get corrupted, thus making Unreadable PST file and so crucial data and info cannot be accessed by the users, which were saved in these PST files on their systems’ hard disk drives.

Note: PST Viewer is a free software available to make file readable.

Reasons for PST file Corrupted and Unreadable

Some of the probable reasons and causes corrupting Outlook’s PST files, causing Unreadable PST file are given below:

  • Severe attacks by malware or viruses on hard disk drive where PST files are saved can result in PST file corruption, thus making them unreadable
  • Bad sectors present on hard disk drive where Outlook’s PST files have been saved can lead to PST files’ header-damage at times, after that files become inaccessible or unreadable
  • Old ways to terminate MS Outlook program
  • Wrong system shutdowns
  • Power surges while PST files are still active can sometimes lead to unreadable PST files
  • Outlook program’s malfunctioning due to any of the following:
  1. Frequent freezing
  2. Frequent hangs
  3. Incorrect configuration
  4. Valid security certificates missing
  5. Not proper preference settings
  • Not appropriate way to install/update MS Windows Operating System version can sometimes lead to Outlook cannot start issue or unreadable
  • PST files crossing max file size limit
  • Errors while importing PST files from one machine to other
  • Errors while exporting PST files from one system to some other system can corrupt.

Resolution to Solve Unreadable PST File

When Outlook’s PST files stops to respond owing to any corruption issue or some damage as discussed in above circumstances, then users can’t read those files and can’t access any data and information contained inside these Outlook’s PST files. Thus, for resolving the issue of these unreadable PST files, users must use some good commercial PST Recovery software.

Usefulness of Quick Solution

PST File Repair Tool by SysTools is an excellent software that can fix problematic & Unreadable PST file. It ensures that it does not make any changes to the contents of the files.

Download Now Purchase Now

Concluding Lines

Data corruption is a bitter truth and we cannot do away with them. But what we can do for sure is to find the fixes for error : Outlook PST unreadable . Commercial tools provide easy resolving processes wherein users can speedily resolve the corruption issues.

  author

By Andrew Jackson

I am SQL DBA and SQL Server blogger too. I like to share about SQL Server and the problems related to it as well as their solution and also I do handle database related user queries, server or database maintenance, database management, etc. I love to share my knowledge with SQL Geeks.