OL2002: Outlook May Appear to Stop Responding When Background Synchronization with a Domino Mailbox Occurs to Retrieve New E-Mail

When you start Microsoft Outlook 2002 Connector, and the program performs an automatic background synchronization with your Domino mailbox, CPU use may increase dramatically and Microsoft Outlook may appear to stop responding (hang).

Note The severity of this problem and the chance that it will occur increases as the number of new unsynchronized e-mails in your Domino mailbox increases.

This problem occurs when Outlook 2002 Connector synchronizes with your Domino mailbox and downloads the header and the body of many of new e-mail messages.

How to Obtain the Hotfix

This issue is fixed in the Outlook 2002 Connector Hotfix Package October 14, 2003. For additional information, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: After you install this hotfix, follow the steps that are listed in the "More Information" section of this article to set the AutoMessageDownload registry key and to activate the hotfix.

Microsoft has confirmed that this is a problem in the Microsoft products that are listed in the "Applies to" section of this article.

Warning If you use Registry Editor incorrectly, you may cause serious problems that may require you to reinstall your operating system. Microsoft cannot guarantee that you can solve problems that result from using Registry Editor incorrectly. Use Registry Editor at your own risk.
To activate this hotfix, follow these steps:

1. Quit Outlook.
2. Click Start, and then click Run.
3. In the Open box, type regedit, and then click OK.
4. Locate, and then click to select the following registry key:
   HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Microsoft Outlook 2002 Connector
5. After you select the key that is specified in step 4, point to New on the Edit menu, and then click DWORD.
6. Type AutoMessageDownload , and then press ENTER.
7. Right-click AutoMessageDownload , and then click Modify.
8. In the Value data box, type 0, and then click OK.
9. On the File menu, click Exit to quit Registry Editor.

Changes to Outlook 2002 Connector Behavior After You Install the Fix

If you are using a Remote Access Service (RAS) connection and you apply this fix, the following new behaviors are applied by default regardless if you set the AutoMessageDownload registry key to 0. If you are using a Local Access Network (LAN) connection, you must set the AutoMessageDownload registry key to 0 to gain the benefit of these new Outlook 2002 Connector Behaviors.

• Outlook will not download the full messages in the automatic background Synchronization thread when Outlook is restarted.
• Outlook will not download the full messages in the background Synchronization thread when creating a fresh local replica, for example when a new Outlook profile is created.
  
  Note Only the headers of the new messages are downloaded. To obtain the body of the messages where only the headers are downloaded you must do one of the following:
  • To obtain the body of a single message, click the message.
  • To obtain the bodies of all messages, click Send/Receive.
• Outlook 2002 Connector no longer tries to retrieve the body of an e-mail when Outlook 2002 Connector is idle.
• For incremental mails, new mails that come in when Outlook 2002 Connector is running, both the header and the body are retrieved.

Important Considerations

You are using a Local Access Network (LAN) connection, you install the fix that is described in this article, and you have also set the StopDetailedSync registry key that is described in the following Knowledge Base article:

For additional information about this behavior, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: Outlook 2002 Connector behavior will change in the following manner:

• When you click Send/Receive, Outlook 2002 Connector will check your local mail store and if the local store contains any partial messages (messages with headers only), it will retrieve the body of the message.
• Outlook 2002 Connector no longer tries to retrieve the body of an e-mail when Outlook 2002 Connector is idle.
• Outlook 2002 Connector will no longer perform a folder-by-folder comparison with your Domino mailbox when you click Send/Receive, or when background synchronization occurs.

For more information about Microsoft Outlook 2002 Connector, visit the following Microsoft Web site: