Inbox messages in Outlook Express 6 all gone

Entered my OE this morning and found all the inbox messages have gone but
they were still there last night, can someone tell me what will be the cause.
Thanks!

You may find a hidden file that is the old inbox, called Inbox.??? It is
generally in the Windows\Application Data\Identities\{GUID}\Microsoft\Outlook
Express folder. The Identity has a Globally Unique IDentifier or {GUID}
The one you are using now will be called 'Inbox.DBX'
There exist utilities to recover data from these old OE files.
(not free)
DBXtract: http://www.oehelp.com/DBXtract/Default.aspx

Dear Mark, thanks for your guidiance but is there any other free of charge
method to recovery my Inbox.DBX file? Furthermore, can you tell me how it
happened, is my computer being infected by virus or by some other invaders.
Thanks again.

No, I doubt this is a virus problem. A too full inbox causes this. I know of
no free utility do save these, the same site has a less easy to use app for
$7. http://www.oehelp.com/
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Hi Mark, thanks very much. I will not bother to recover those e-mail messages
in my laptop since I have got the other desk top backup. Also thanks for
telling me that this might be caused by the too full Inbox and I'll watch out
for the inbox folder capacity.

[Shardik]

If everything else fails if you cannot find your messages back, have a look at Foxtract.
This tool scans your corrupted dbx file and will extract your e-mails, even if the trees are corrupted (Outlook Express uses tree structures to retrieve the messages).

This tool is free, GPL licensed, the source code is freely available.

--> http://code.google.com/p/foxtract

[AkashicVisit]

I realize this thread might be inactive, but I was hit with the same problem this morning. I knew it was because the inbox was bulging, thanks to someone sending 300 MB of pictures (of plants).

Normally, if you close a few programs, OE 6 is a bit forgiving. You can create subfolders and move things around, delete some files, archive some, and then all is well.

This time, inbox.dbx went from 1.5 GB to 270kb in an instant and I am at a loss to know whether any of the recommended recovery strategies work when the inbox is no longer displaying its previously correct size. Obviously, I am stressed to do not want to create a worse mess.

Many thanks for your excellent forum.