MAPI32.DLL is corrupt or the wrong version

Not very long ago i was put in a situation where i was forced to install windows office 2007 on my laptop. My laptop being few years old didn't seem to go very well with the office 2007 version and was rather sluggish in comparison with office 2003. So, i decided to remove office 2007 and get back to my tried and tested 2003 version on my laptop.

Everything went smoothly and the uninstaller associated with office 2007 did a seemingly good job to uninstall all the 2007 components. Atleast this was what i thought had happened. I only realized the problem once i installed office 2003 and was trying to run outlook. Outlook wouldn't open on my system and would give a message which read something like "Cannot start Microsoft Office Outlook. MAPI32.DLL is corrupt or the wrong version. This could have been caused by installing other messaging software. Please reinstall Outlook.". I thought what the hell is wrong with these office suites. They seem to do something or the other to my system.

Now my mission was to find the solution to this problem. Actually the solution was not that complicated and i found it in the first few results of google itself with the error message as the search text i.e. "Cannot start Microsoft Office Outlook. MAPI32.DLL is corrupt or the wrong version. This could have been caused by installing other messaging software. Please reinstall Outlook." One of the results was the link to the Microsoft support page, which provided the solution which was very easy to implement. For the convenience of my readers, i am providing the solution as provided on the support website as follows:

1. Start Windows Explorer.
2. Locate and then open the following folder on your computer: C:\Program Files\Common Files\System\Msmapi\1033
3. Right-click the MSMapi32.dll file, and then click Rename.

Note The file (Msmapi32.dll) that you are renaming differs from the file (Mapi32.dll) that is mentioned in the error message.
4. Type Msmapi32.old, and then press ENTER to rename the file.
5. Start Outlook 2003.

After following these simple steps my outlook became functional again and i was happy. To read more on the error, and details provided on the support page, click here.

Outlook 2003 showing the statement "verify that you have access to this directory" and its solution!

I started with a problem in my outlook (2003), the IMAP folder inbox wouldn't become the default folder. It took me sometime just to figure how to make the IMAP folder the default one and for your help, i have again put the link of the article here.

Few days later, i had a problem in outlook in which the default signature couldn't be applied to any of my messages and whenever i tried to make any change in the settings, outlook would freeze and restart. Getting annoyed with the situation, i tried to repair office (2003) but to no avail. Then i asked the system admin to have a look and see if he could do something. He tried the system restore and all other stuff including the deletion of registry files. This other stuff became too big for my system to chew especially that registry thing. It (laptop) decided not to work and always pop up the windows installer. So bugged with the situation, i tried to uninstall the stupid office suite. However, windows which is built not to leave you until death, didn't even allow me to uninstall or reinstall and gave the stupid message, "verify that you have access to this directory" or something which meant like the statement mentioned earlier. Annoyed with the situation, i thought that its time to backup all the information, reformat the system and get everything in place and thereafter install the Windows 7 RC and have some fun on my laptop. Luckily, i happened to find an article on CNET which suggested Revo uninstaller to do the job (article here). My old friend Revo which i had on my system long back and about which i had forgotten was brought back into my memory. Then i did the whole uninstallation as per the suggestion in the article and there i was with no windows installer bugging me. Ultimately Revo turned out to be the MAN built for this kind of a job. I plan to have it on my system, i recommend the users of this article to do the same to help them getting frustrated from these kind of situations. :)

Change default opening folder from inbox of local folder to IMAP inbox folder in outlook 2003

It is a common problem which plagues most of us who want to install IMAP in their outlook or want to shift from POP3 to IMAP like me. I faced such a problem for quite some time and then finally found a simple solution for changing the default opening folder i.e. Inbox of local folder to Inbox of the IMAP folder.

The steps to follow are as follows:
1. open outlook and click on Tools
2. under Tools, click Options
3. under Options select Other on the top tab
4. under Other click on Advanced Options in the General block
5. under Advanced Options, simply select the Browse the folder in the Startup in this folder.
6. you can virtually select any folder which you want to open on startup.

i hope it was explained in detail. please drop your comments if you found the post useful.