Outlook 2010 - .msg file error " Cannot read the item"

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_{Thursday, February 21, 2013 3:01 PM}

We are running Outlook 2010 and Office 365.

I have a user that saves important emails to his network drive as a .msg files. Most of the files he can open but there are a few that he cannot. He receives the message "Cannot read the item" when he tries to open them.

When I go to the network drive and try to open the .msg file I get the same message. I had him email the message to me as an attachment. When I try to open the attachment from inside the message I get error "you don't' have appropriate permission to perform this operation". When I save the attachment to my computer I receive the "Cannot read the item" error again.

Any ideas would be appreciated.

All replies (11)

_{Thursday, February 21, 2013 3:26 PM}

File -> Options -> Mail -> (Save Messages section) -> "Use Unicode Format" (is it checked or not)

Anil Kumar (MCITP)

_{Thursday, February 21, 2013 3:33 PM}

Use Unicode format is checked for both my outlook and my user.

thanks

_{Thursday, February 21, 2013 3:42 PM}

Can you un-check that & try to open the message .msg which is present in the network drive.

Re-launch the outlook before testing.

Anil Kumar (MCITP)

_{Thursday, February 21, 2013 3:58 PM}

Same issue after following the instructions. No luck. I tried to open the attachment, the network location, and the saved to desktop version.

_{Monday, February 25, 2013 2:54 AM}

"Most of the files he can open but there are a few that he cannot. He receives the message "Cannot read the item" when he tries to open them. "

Can you point what the special they are? I remember when we try to open a MSG file with large number of Recipients or Attachment, Outlook has a check for the count. If any of the value exceed 2048 it treats that message as corrupt and does not open it.

If they are so, I am afraid there isn’t a workaround which will help us open this mail in Outlook.

Any other details, please let me know.

Cheers,
Tony Chen
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_{Thursday, February 28, 2013 1:38 AM}

Any any update?

Tony Chen

_{Thursday, February 28, 2013 3:30 PM}

There only 2 or 3 recipients and maybe one attachment. So it doesn't hit the 2048. At this point I'm guessing the msg file is corrupt. Is there any way of repairing a corrupt msg file.?

_{Friday, March 1, 2013 1:59 AM}

Repairing an MSG file is necessary when damage to the structure of the hard drive upon which it is contained has rendered the file corrupt or inaccessible.

Run "chkdsk /f" in CMD to check the result.

However, if the MSG file is broken itself, there might be no way to fix it. We might consider to get it back if there is any backup on server site. Thanks.

_{Monday, March 4, 2013 1:19 AM}

Hi,

Just checking in to see if the information was helpful. Please let us know if you would like further assistance.

_{Friday, March 8, 2013 2:59 AM}

Hi,

I'm marking the reply as answer as there has been no update for a couple of days.
If you come back to find it doesn't work for you, please reply to us and unmark the answer.

_{Monday, March 11, 2013 2:34 PM}

Sorry for the delayed response. Your suggestion did not work.

thanks

Last updated on 2013-02-21

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Outlook 2010 - .msg file error " Cannot read the item"

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All replies (11)

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