It doesn’t get much simpler when it comes to recovering e-mail from corrupt Outlook Express databases (.dbx or .mbx) that RecoveryFix for Outlook Express. Point the program at the corrupted file and after a brief scan, it presents you with a list of e-mails it can recover, then the option to recover them to individual .eml files or wholesale in a .dbx file. It also allows you to recover only e-mails that you’re missing, skip deleted e-mails, or restore only the e-mails you select.
Unfortunately, RecoveryFix fell a bit short of the competition when it came to the actual recovery process. To test the program, I deliberately damaged some .dbx files to various using Ma?l H?rz’s HxD hex editor–just the file header in one and both the header and one message in another. RecoveryFix recovered only 74 of a possible 77/76 recoverable messages from the two files and for some reason, didn’t fill the From: field in its display.
Though the price is tempting and the program easy to use, I have a hard time recommending RecoveryFix for Outlook Express simply because it didn’t recover everything in my rather mild series of tests. Personally, I rely on Advanced Outlook Express Repair, with its nice combination of price and performance.
Note: This link takes you to the vendor’s site, where you can download the latest version of the software.
–Jon L. Jacobi