HELPPPPP!!!!!!

[sam225]

I just spent three days cleaning up all of my contacts on my desktop. I then deleted all of the ones in my Samsung i730 (PPC 2003 2nd Ed) (I also have Agenda Fusion) when I sync'd I lost everything from both desktop and handheld with the exception of new contacts that I created over the past three days. How do I get them back?

Please, please, please help!

[Brad Adrian]

Ouch! Do you have a backup PST file, or are you working from a server that misght have a backup of it?

[sam225]

I have no idea if I have a backup .pst file. How can I find that out? I sync it with my desktop, no server involved.

[Jason Dunn]

I hate to tell you this, but unless you have a backup, you're completely screwed. :-( If memory serves, the contacts that are removed don't go into the Deleted Items folder in Outlook, they just vanish. ActiveSync looked at your empty Pocket PC and said "Oh look, he deleted all his contacts, let's do the same in Outlook". I hope I'm wrong (did you check the Deleted Items folder?) but I suspect I'm not.

I did that once by accident, and it's really upsetting that Microsoft still hasn't fixed that problem (I reported it to them 3+ years ago).

A hard lesson to learn, but always always always back up your data. Give this a read for more: http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/articles.php?action=expand,48954

[pheral]

Presuming you mean Outlook when you say you synch with your Desktop, a .pst file is an archive file of all your Outlook data.

Click File then Open and click 'personal folder' or 'outlook data file' to view the .pst file. Then you should be able to select it, and click 'ok' or 'view' to see the info in Outlook... but here i get fuzzy and i can't test further at the mo.
I guess if the info you want rescued is in that file, you can import it to recover, but not sure about that part.

See how far you get with viewing the .pst, and i'm sure someone else can fill in the blanks i've left.

[Jason Dunn]

I have no idea if I have a backup .pst file. How can I find that out? I sync it with my desktop, no server involved.

If you didn't make a backup (as in, regularly backing up your data), there will be no backup...Outlook doesn't do backups on it's own, you need to. :(

[pheral]

aha, blanks filled in. :wink:

sorry it's bad news. :(

Any chance you have a backup of your PocketPC data from any time recently, that you can rescue your contacts on your pda using that?

[sam225]

Can I do a restore to another date?

[Jason Dunn]

Can I do a restore to another date?

A system restore doesn't touch your data files, and I think XP considers outlook.pst files to be data files. It can't hurt to try, but I'm doubtful it will work.

[freemans]

Better keep a regular backup to avoid something like this one.

I use Sprite Backup (http://www.spritesoftware.com), it s a life time saver. :)

[Steven Cedrone]

Not that this helps now, but you may want to download this:

Outlook 2003 Add-in: Personal Folders Backup

Brief Description
The Personal Folders Backup download creates backup copies of your .PST files at regular intervals, in Outlook 2000 and later versions, making it easy to keep all of your Outlook folders safely backed up.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&familyid=8B081F3A-B7D0-4B16-B8AF-5A6322F4FD01

[Brad Adrian]

Thanks, Steve! I'd almost forgotten about that one!

[Nurhisham Hussein]

Nice! I've been using SyncToy to backup my Outlook data file (among other things), but that has to be manually started - this sounds like it'd be more useful. Off to download!

[Cybrid]

If memory serves the deleted items should be in Outlook's deleted items bin. Unfortunately the defaults are set to delete quite regularly. Check anyway.