Suddenly lost all my emails in Windows Live Mail

It seems that the moderators that responded do not understand the WLMail maintenance procedure and do not understand what it means to not have a Hotmail account.


[quote user=Maudestan]The only thing that happened was that as I 'Shut Down' the PC the message 'Recovering unused disk space' came up which happens every few weeks.[/quote]
When WLMail closes some housekeeping is performed.  You should always close WLMail several minutes before turning off the computer.

After 100 closes, unused disk space is recovered.  You can change the setting by going to Alt, F, O, M, Advanced tab, Maintenance button, ..........
I am not clear on the maintenance procedure.
My guess is that a copy of 'MSMESSAGESTORE' is placed in the recycle bin and 'MSMESSAGESTORE' is rebuilt.   The rebuilding process was stopped which created your problem.


Follow this procedure and see if you have recovered all of your emails.

1. You will first need to select the Show hidden files option.

a. Open Windows Explorer and click Organize / Folder and search options. Click the View Tab.

b. Place a check mark in the Show Hidden files, folders and drives option.

Click Apply/OK.

c. Close and restart Windows Explorer.

2. Open the WLM Store folder.

a. Navigate to the following folder.

C:\Users\your name\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail

(Where 'your name' is the name of the account that you use to logon to Windows 7)

b. In this folder you will see all of the WLM storage folders. Each email account will have its own group of folders.

c. Any general storage folders that you created will under the main Storage Folders item.

3. Make a copy of the Windows Live Mail folders previous version.

a. Right click the Windows Live Mail folder and select Properties / Previous Versions Tab.

b. After the list populates, select a version of the folder with a date and time prior to when the folders were deleted.

c. Click the Copy Button. In the Copy dialog box, select the Desktop as the location to place the copied folder.