Outlook.ost is Not an Outlook Data File (.ost) – Resolution Methods

The Outlook is an email application and it is of desktop based email client application. This MS Outlook is a personal information store, which is a part of MS Office Suite. Outlook email application includes calendars, tasks, contacts, notes, journals etc. This application is a stand-alone application which can work in accordance with MS Exchange Server and MS Share Point Server for different or for the multiple users.

Use of Outlook mail application like emails, calendars, tasks and other items are saved on the mail server or on your PC. The file format that is stored as the.ost or.pst. The PST is called as the personal storage table and this file will have the all mailbox data items. OST files are called Offline Storage Table and these files are used while you have an Exchange Server account and want to work without having Internet Access.

Even though the OST works in Offline mode sometimes there may be an error like "Outlook.ost is not an Outlook data file (.ost)" or "Y2014 is not an Outlook data" while you wished to import OST file to Outlook applicati0on. When this happens users feel difficulty for the users to distinguish the occurrence of this error of their OST files. Therefore, this article will help to recover this error.

Users Query Regarding Y2014 error

"Hi, I was trying to import Outlook OST file from one system to another. But while doing this in between an error window appeared on my screen saying OST file is not an Outlook data file error. I don’t know why this appeared. Can anybody please help me to fix this Y2014 error."

Overcome Outlook.ost is not an Outlook data file (.ost) – Manually

To eliminate this error there are manual procedures, so here it is discussed different methodology so that users could choose the tricks as their needs. Also, can eliminate the Y2014 error.

Method#1: Checking OST File Attribute and Open File

Verify that the OST file is stored on your computer or not. Normally this error is seen while the users are trying to import the OST file which is really small. The other cases are that if the files are stored in external drives then there are chances that the file is in read only mode status. Thus, users need to check the read only status while the files are transferring to the read only status.

1. Move to the file>> Right click on File>> from the list select "Properties"
2. Now from general tab make sure that the Read-only attribute is blank or not selected.
3. If it is ticked un-check and run Outlook>> "File Menu"
4. Now Open>> after that "Open Outlook Data File".
5. In the newly opened window, browse to the destination folder where the OST file is located, then double-click the file to open it.

Method#2: Fix Outlook.ost is not an Outlook data file (.ost) Using Scanpst.exe

Instead of the read-only factors of the OST files the file corruption is also another fact of occurring Y2014 error. To resolve these users need to use the Scanost.exe inbuilt tool in Outlook. This will help to scan and repair.ost file and to do this perform the following steps.

• To perform this find the Scanost.exe file directory
• By double-clicking run the tool
• Now browse the OST file and hit the start button to scan it
• After some section or steps in this process users will be directed to new screen and from their hit "Repair" option to start the process.
• After the completion of this process a po-pup box will be appeared as below.

Automated Solution The automated solution is nothing but the professional tool or the third party tool. This will help you to repair corrupt OST file and one of the best converters is that the OST to PST Converter. Although if the inbuilt tool doesn’t function well you can use OST to PST Converter. To remove or eliminate the Y2014 error.

Conclusion

The major reason of Outlook OST related error is the error corruptions therefore, handling of such an error will be made carefully. Here, the resolution for Outlook.ost is not an Outlook data file (.ost) is discussed with corresponding manual procedures and also using a snap-shot solution.

I am Software Engineer by Profession and Tech Blogger by passion. I love to write about technologies and solve user query on different forums.