Although Outlook is a wonderful tool for your email needs and managing other personal information, it is not without its share of problems. Sluggish behavior, sudden crashes and freezes/hangs are some of the most common problems Outlook users encounter.
In this article, we discuss one such error where Outlook crashes and give an error ‘Microsoft Outlook has stopped working’. If you click on the error message, the Event Name shows ‘APPCRASH’ and the module will be ‘KERNELBASE.DLL’. This error usually occurs due to add-ins interfering with your Outlook or a corrupt PST file. Now let us see how to solve this error using some simple troubleshooting steps.
Solution 1: Disable add-ins
Normally, add-ins are useful in providing additional features to your Outlook, but they are also known to create problems in some cases. A good solution is to disable add-ins using the following steps.
- Open Outlook and click on File > Options > Add-ins
- Click on the ‘Go’ button in the Manage drop-down
- Uncheck all the add-ins that are selected and click Ok
Now if Outlook works normally without issues, it means add-ins were causing trouble. But the problem is likely with one add-in and not all of them. So you can enable one add-in at a time and restart Outlook. Now check if it works without any issues. Similarly, repeat for all add-ins until you have identified the problematic add-in.
So once you’ve got that add-in tracked down, you can disable it and use Outlook.
Solution 2: Run the Inbox Repair tool
If disabling add-ins doesn’t help you resolve the issue, the problem mostly lies in your PST file. The PST file could be corrupt due to various reasons such as size issues, corruption in the storage area where it’s stored or due to other reasons.
In order to repair corruption, you can make use of the very useful built-in repair feature called ‘Inbox Repair tool’. This is also called Scanpst.exe as it is specialized in repairing PST files. To run this tool, open File Explorer and search for ‘Scanpst.exe’ in the search bar. Once you find the tool, double-click on it to run the tool. Then locate the PST location according to the Outlook version you have and click on Repair. Now your file will be repaired.
Solution 3: Use Remo Repair PST
However, if Scanpst is unable to repair your file, you may need to make use of professional PST repair tools such as Remo Repair PST. This software is designed to repair all kinds of corruption in PST files. Moreover, it is designed to work with all kinds of PST files like large or compressed ones.
Once the PST file is repaired using Remo Repair, the same file can be used with your Outlook to solve the problem.
It is also important to note that the software works with PST files created on all versions of Microsoft Outlook like 2000, 2003, 2007, 2010, 2013 and 2016. So you don’t need to worry about compatibility issues. Download a free trial today and see how you can repair the PST file easily. Check it out today!