Outlook 2007 issue with vista?

Hey all,

Have one employee running vista business fully updated with m$ office fully updated (2007)

When he tries to open up an HTML mail it will just hang on "contacting server". I have troubleshooted everything I know. If I take off the option to automatically to download images in an HTML it works fine until you try and download the pictures. Everyone else is working great except this one.

Any ideas.

Screenshot attached.

Do you have this installed??

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/957909

MLF

To be honest with you it is fully updated via ms update however I have requested this hot fix and will report findings :P

Thanks MLF

I would check the usual suspects (firewall, AV). Is that panda I see in the tray?
yuck (technical term). Is panda fully patched (can it ever really be. lol)?

Sorry for going off topic here...

but I am interested in your comment about Panda Cheap Scotch Ron.

I was looking at replacing Symantec Corp with Panda.

I would be interested in your thoughts...you can PM me if you prefer

MLF

MLF,

AV in general is a real pain in the neck. I spend considerable time fighting virus, spam, attempted attacks, etc... It's become a kind of hobby (read... obsession) for me. I've eval'd most popular offerings (in the middle of eval'ing several on windoze 7 beta) as well as built some homegrown solutions. Over time, you learn that some vendors simply do a better job and others don't. No one offering is perfect, but some are clearly more problematic than others. It's not just panda that I have had bad experiences with. Replacing Symantec is a good idea. I dont take any joy in bashing these vendors but the reality is that over the years, the quality of the panda software is substandard.

Most recently... Against my recommendations, a friend of mine bought a vista home laptop. it came with panda av, so that is what he ran. he had problems from the get-go. It got dropped in my lap the first day he had it. We patched it that day and a few months later it was back on my bench. He had upgraded to the latest version. This is when he began having issues with Outlook 2007. After spending the better part of an evening without success, I installed avast home edition for him. Havent heard from him since. ;)

While no offering is perfect, for basic/standard ms desktops (e.g. MS Office, IE), AV should work right out of the "box" and it should be mostly transparent to the user. As your desktop becomes more complex (especially outlook add-ins) or if you use non-standard browser settings, you may need to adjust. Over the years, I have found avast to be the best all around offering. We use the pro version here in the office and the home edition at home. We have it running on Win XP, WinServer 2003, vista home and vista business.

If you have specific questions, please ask.

CSR
PS.. Disclosure Statement: No, I do not benefit in any way from endorsing avast.

Thank you for your comments...

I like the central management of the Corp Edition...definately makes my life easier.

Will look at avast.

MLF

cider, if fully patched means office 2007 sp1 and the sp was applied to office after the panda (assuming it in fact is panda running) install, suggest you try to reinstall panda. also if you have outlook add-ins, try disabling them before reinstall panda. then install them after the reinstall. that worked for "some" of the addins (pst backup), didnt work for others (BCM, Junxure).

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I would check the usual suspects (firewall, AV). Is that panda I see in the tray?
yuck (technical term). Is panda fully patched (can it ever really be. lol)?

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I work for them so yes I am sure I have it at 100 % eff :)

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Sorry for going off topic here...

but I am interested in your comment about Panda Cheap Scotch Ron.

I was looking at replacing Symantec Corp with Panda.

I would be interested in your thoughts...you can PM me if you prefer

MLF

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If you want more information about Panda, I do their technichal so I will give you an unbaised view if you let me know your network setup.

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cider, if fully patched means office 2007 sp1 and the sp was applied to office after the panda (assuming it in fact is panda running) install, suggest you try to reinstall panda. also if you have outlook add-ins, try disabling them before reinstall panda. then install them after the reinstall. that worked for "some" of the addins (pst backup), didnt work for others (BCM, Junxure).
__________________

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Thanks for the tips, I will give it a go.

UPDATE

Uninstalled Panda and the problem still persists. I have removed all plug ins except Google desktop for the user. This seems to me like a M$ issue. Do I need to use one of my "phone calls" to m$ for this or is there other things to troubleshoot.

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This seems to me like a M$ issue.

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It's a very good point. It's tough to determine root cause, but even if it's a flaw in ms code, the av vendor should find and fix it. the challenge of course, is with all the other things that can be installed on a desktop, there is not practical standard desktop with which to regression test. Hence, the AV vendors are always playing catch up in a reactive mode.

Did you ever try the hotfix that mlf suggested?

Tell us more about the symptoms. Is it strictly an outlook issue? does ALL html hang?
what is the default browser? Can you determine which process hangs? What are the security settings in the browser?
What version of panda?

Cider..does user have Outlook Business Contacts installed...try and remove that.

Can user ping server by name???

have you removed outlook and reinstalled??? (am assuming you are connected to an exchange server)

Did it ever work and just stop working??

MLF

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Did you ever try the hotfix that mlf suggested?

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Yes

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Outlook Business Contacts

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Haven't seen this software before but no , not installed.

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have you removed outlook and reinstalled

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Haven't done this and yes it is on exchange.

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Can user ping server by name

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IP and name.

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Did it ever work and just stop working??

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Yes worked perfectly until when I created this post.

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Tell us more about the symptoms. Is it strictly an outlook issue? does ALL html hang?
what is the default browser? Can you determine which process hangs? What are the security settings in the browser?
What version of panda?

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Yes an outlook issue, all html hangs. Default browser is ff (3.0.5). Security settings are on default, nothing special and I will try and get a process explorer going to check the processes. With Panda uninstalled and nothing on the machine it still hangs so we can rule Panda out.

Thanks for the help guys

Ive attached a Process explorer log while it happens - nothing seems to leech CPU.

What process is associated to open the pictures?

What happens if you try to save them, then open them offline?

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What happens if you try to save them, then open them offline?

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Do you mean saving them to your desktop and then opening them or do you mean putting outlook into offline mode and then opening the HTML mail?

I would uninstall outlook and reinstall...soumd like an associated\shared file\dll may have been updated or overwritten by another software or process and a reinstall wil ensure outlook has all correct versions of the files.

MLF

if there is no AV installed and you are still having the problem, I agree with mlf re: reinstall outlook. if that does do it, try making IE the default browser just to see if it might be FF.

Alright,

Thanks guys.

I will do so.

EDIT:

Alright, made IE default and still it persists. is it possible to do a repair of outlook? or must I fully uninstall and reinstall.

Stupid Q : does the pst file save the rules created within outlook?

Not sure why your exporting to pst when you are connected to an exchange server....as removing outlook will not remove the mailbox

and no you use the tools>rules>options to export rules.

Before importing the rules...see if the html email works....may be a rule interfering

Personally I would reinstall...up to you though

repair..if that dont work..remove>reboot>reinstall

MLF

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Not sure why your exporting to pst when you are connected to an exchange serve

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SMM, I have a few clients that do this. They dont trust their IT group and they want their mail local (on their laptops).

Cider, known issues with pst files and exchange. There have been times where we have needed to recreate the outlook/mail config because it got corrupted. When this happened all sorts of hanging issues. If the reinstall doesnt resolve your problem, try deleting and reconfiguring the outlook mail confiig from the control panel on the local machine.

Also, what version of Exchange? know incompatibility between Outlook 2007 and older (e.g. 5.x, 6.5) versions of Exchange.

CSR

AFAIK...when working with outlook 2003 and exchange 2003 in cached mode there is already a copy stored locally....in the users local settings as outlook.ost

The pst is used for backup\archive.......... and when mucking with a mailbox online is probably best to export to pst.

as for removing outlook and reinstalling...this in no way should affect the users mailbox...maybe some rules or settings...but not the data

MLF

AKA

SMM ;)

reinstall internet explorer.

Hey all,

Outlook = 2007

Server 2k3 with exchange 2007.

Going to do a reinstall outlook and IE.

Will post results.

edit

Ok trying to reinstall IE is nasty! Where is the option! Under windows components in vista there is no IE and trying to run the IE7 install is telling me it isn't supported on this computer, rofl?

Anyway, uninstalled office and reinstalling now.

Thanks for the help.

OK - uninstalled , reinstalled outlook. Didn't help.

Will try and figure out how to reinstall IE , if that doesnt work then it is definitely server side which I have limited access too.

This this crap started when these guys decided to upgrade to 2007 exchange with no training at all , download tutorials from technet to do this. We have certificate issues and all sorts of errors after this. Dont know why we jsut didn't stay on 2003 exchange.

Edit

Found this on another forum.

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You can't reinstall it, regardless of whether or not you want to. IE7 for XP
is an entirely different install package. The number one cause of problems
with IE starting up is with plug-ins/add-ons loading with it. Try disabling
these from tools/manage add-ons.

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Just in case you have not seen this...
http://support.microsoft.com/KB/555854

I have a really hard time thinking this is server based when only one user has the issue.

Log on with another account on the same machine, and see if they have the same issues.

and try creating the user with the issues account on a nother machine and see if the issue can be recreated.

This will show if it is user accout\mailbox issue\ or machine issue. If it occurs with another account on the same machine...there is something on the machine interfering

if it occurs on another machine where outlook works fine...but user is still having the issue...then it is mailbox and server side.

MLF