Recover Deleted Mails In Outlook 2003

Ever noticed if you need to recover some mails which have been deleted by you by mistake. A simple trick could solve the problem but this will work only if you are using a Microsoft Exchange Server e-mail account and will able to recover mails in the period as specified in the policy settings on Microsoft Exchange Server.

There can be two ways in which a file has been deleted.

Case 1: A mail is deleted and then also deleted from Deleted Items folder
Solution: Go to Microsoft Outlook, and click the Deleted Items Folder, then you need to go to Tools –> Recover Deleted Items. All the items that you have deleted within the time frame set in the policy should be available for you to select. Just select the one’s you want back and hit the recover button. But by default the Recover Deleted Items functionality is only enabled on the Deleted Items folder; items that are hard deleted using Shift + Del cannot be recovered. A small change need to be done for that as explained below

Case 2: A mail is hard deleted using Shift + Del
Solution: A small change to the Registry can recover the hard deleted mails from any folder.

Caution If you use the registry editor incorrectly, you might cause serious problems that might require you to reinstall your operating system. Microsoft cannot guarantee that you can solve problems that result from using the registry editor incorrectly. Use the registry editor at your own risk.

Steps to change the registry

1. Exit Outlook.
2. Start Registry Editor(Regedt32.exe).
3. Browse to My Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Microsoft\Exchange\Client\Options.
4. On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click DWORD Value.
5. Type the name DumpsterAlwaysOn.( Note Do not type any spaces in the name.)
6. Set the DWORD value to 1.
7. Close Registry Editor
8. Restart Outlook.

The Tools menu now has the Recover Deleted Items command for every Outlook folder.