I have been using Pmail since before 1997 and have maintained a continuous email history in Pmail since 1997, with several hundred thousand messages in my system. During the years my PC has lost power and otherwise crashed many, many times. Never did I experience any serious loss of email history or corruption. I have had a number of smaller issues with Pmail but nothing that endangered the body of email that constitutes the history of my business and serves as a de facto database of all the technical and business issues with which I have dealt in the last 12 years. Until this point I have been pleased that Pmail has been able to handle so many messages and has served as a solid tool around which my entire business revolves. With no confidence that any other email client can do this, I have been reluctant to change to any other client. Until now.
Some months ago I upgraded from WinXP Pro 32-bit to WinXP Pro 64-bit. Overall I have found the 64-bit WinXP Pro to be better and cleaner than the 32-bit, and it handles the larger memory that was the driving reason for moving to a 64-bit OS. My Pmail lives in C:\PMAIL and I have installed new versions of Pmail over the old ones, never with any serious problems.
A few weeks ago my PC suffered a BSoD (Blue Screen of Death), the first such I have seen since moving up to the 64-bit OS. I had experienced a number of those while using the 32-bit OS, but never with any serious consequences for Pmail.
After the crash it seemed like Pmail lost its basic configuration information. I had to enter all the Internet settings, most of what is in Options, all over again.
The real problem, though, is that my folders and trays got badly scrambled. Trays disappeared, seemingly at random, and some folders that had been in trays popped up to the root mailbox level while others remained in their trays. Many messages seem to have disappeared entirely while others have not. Some folders that had contained a number of individual correspondents now contain only one. Many others are no longer present.
Most troubling is that a series of geographic trays containing all the new business I have done since 2004 have disappeared. Some of the folders that were in those trays have popped up to the root mailbox level but others are nowhere to be found in Pmail. I searched for one correspondent recently and the search folder found messages but could not be opened. I have examined the HIERARCH.PM file and found no obvious problems other than things simply missing. For example, the tray and folder hierarchy containing all the new business does not seem to be present in that file.
I have a backup of my PMAIL directory, some months old. If I simply restore to that point I will have lost all correspondence since that time, and I cannot figure out how to find and save the messages that seem to have disappeared.
I have the impression that this problem resulted from some difference in the way 64-bit WinXP Pro handles recovery of its file system from unexpected shutdown. Nothing like this ever happened in many, many power failures and OS crashes using 32-bit WInXP Pro. Still, it is difficult to imagine how any OS recovery could have resulted in the very complex and weird scrambling of my Pmail data.
Is there any way to rebuild the hierarchy in any meaningful way? I cannot afford to use an email system that can suffer such a catastrophic failure as seems to have happened. If I have to lose months of recent correspondence and find no way of finding/rebuilding the scrambled tray and folder hierarchy I will have to reluctantly move to a different email client.
I am currently using Pegasus Mail Version 4.31 (Win32) Dec 14 2005. I have no other apps working with Pmail -- no optional helpers or add-ons.
David Harris once told me that he had over a million messages in his Pegasus Mail. If so, his exposure to the type of problem I am having would be 5-10 times greater than mine, and his difficulty of taking manual actions to unscramble it would be similarly greater.
<p>I have been using Pmail since before 1997 and have maintained a continuous email history in Pmail since 1997, with several hundred thousand messages in my system.&nbsp; During the years my PC has lost power and otherwise crashed many, many times.&nbsp; Never did I experience any serious loss of email history or corruption.&nbsp; I have had a number of smaller issues with Pmail but nothing that endangered the body of email that constitutes the history of my business and serves as a de facto database of all the technical and business issues with which I have dealt in the last 12 years.&nbsp; Until this point I have been pleased that Pmail has been able to handle so many messages and has served as a solid tool around which my entire business revolves.&nbsp; With no confidence that any other email client can do this, I have been reluctant to change to any other client.&nbsp; Until now.
</p><p>Some months ago I upgraded from WinXP Pro 32-bit to WinXP Pro 64-bit. Overall I have found the 64-bit WinXP Pro to be better and cleaner than the 32-bit, and it handles the larger memory that was the driving reason for moving to a 64-bit OS.&nbsp; My Pmail lives in C:\PMAIL and I have installed new versions of Pmail over the old ones, never with any serious problems.</p><p>A few weeks ago my PC suffered a BSoD (Blue Screen of Death), the first such I have seen since moving up to the 64-bit OS.&nbsp; I had experienced a number of those while using the 32-bit OS, but never with any serious consequences for Pmail. </p><p>After the crash it seemed like Pmail lost its basic configuration information.&nbsp; I had to enter all the Internet settings, most of what is in Options, all over again.</p><p>The real problem, though, is that my folders and trays got badly scrambled.&nbsp; Trays disappeared, seemingly at random, and some folders that had been in trays popped up to the root mailbox level while others remained in their trays.&nbsp; Many messages seem to have disappeared entirely while others have not.&nbsp; Some folders that had contained a number of individual correspondents now contain only one.&nbsp; Many others are no longer present.
</p><p>Most troubling is that a series of geographic trays containing all the new business I have done since 2004 have disappeared.&nbsp; Some of the folders that were in those trays have popped up to the root mailbox level but others are nowhere to be found in Pmail.&nbsp; I searched for one correspondent recently and the search folder found messages but could not be opened.&nbsp; I have examined the HIERARCH.PM file and found no obvious problems other than things simply missing.&nbsp; For example, the tray and folder hierarchy containing all the new business does not seem to be present in that file.
</p><p>I have a backup of my PMAIL directory, some months old.&nbsp; If I simply restore to that point I will have lost all correspondence since that time, and I cannot figure out how to find and save the messages that seem to have disappeared.</p><p>I have the impression that this problem resulted from some difference in the way 64-bit WinXP Pro handles recovery of its file system from unexpected shutdown.&nbsp; Nothing like this ever happened in many, many power failures and OS crashes using 32-bit WInXP Pro.&nbsp; Still, it is difficult to imagine how any OS recovery could have resulted in the very complex and weird scrambling of my Pmail data.
</p><p>Is there any way to rebuild the hierarchy in any meaningful way?&nbsp; I cannot afford to use an email system that can suffer such a catastrophic failure as seems to have happened.&nbsp; If I have to lose months of recent correspondence and find no way of finding/rebuilding the scrambled tray and folder hierarchy I will have to reluctantly move to a different email client. </p><p>I am currently using Pegasus Mail Version 4.31 (Win32) Dec 14 2005.&nbsp; I have no other apps working with Pmail -- no optional helpers or add-ons. </p><p>David Harris once told me that he had over a million messages in his Pegasus Mail.&nbsp; If so, his exposure to the type of problem I am having would be 5-10 times greater than mine, and his difficulty of taking manual actions to unscramble it would be similarly greater.
</p>
