Canceling "rebuilding database" seems to work fine

Fairly often, maybe once a week I get a crash from EM Client and it’s usually for no good reason, like hitting “Print” or moving to a new window, etc. In the last month or so instead of waiting for “rebuilding database” to complete I just hit cancel and EM Client opens fine. 

Is this ok to do this? If it’s a more serious problem, will it not let me cancel?

eM Client will always run the database check if it was not closed down properly. Mostly there will be nothing wrong with the data, but if you are going to go that route, maybe make sure you have regular backups.

Of course if all your data is online, then there is very little chance you will not be able to recover everything through re-syncing with the server if something does go horribly wrong.

It will always let you cancel the database check, even if there is a problem.

Regarding the cause of the improper shut down, this could be a database issue. Starting eM Client with a blank database, and then setting up your accounts again could sort that out. 

To do that first make a backup of eM Client (Menu > File > Backup) then close eM Client and delete the  *C:\Users* _ yourusername _ \AppData\Roaming\eM Client  folder. You may need to enable hidden items in Windows Explorer to get there. 

When you restart eM Client, you will have an empty database. Setup your accounts and see what happens.

If that does not make any difference you can restore your old database (Menu > File > Restore) or just keep the current one.

My EM Clint files are all stored on my computer, nothing online. I backup every night and I also have a backup I did with EM Client under Settings. 

I make sure EM Client is closed when I backup. If something did go haywire, I can use the backup files and I keep my emails on my server for 12 days, so I can always re-download emails to fix the database with the emails that were lost in 1 day.

It’s possible I may lose some items in my Sent box, but I could get them back by emailing the people that I sent to.

I must say some times rebuilding the database comes at very inopportune times, so I cancel it, especially if it’s something that seems senseless for causing a crash like quickly moving to a different folder or printing. If my computer shuts itself down then I’ll let the database rebuild. 

If I cancel rebuilding the database and it opens ok, would there be any benefit from manually rebuilding the database? I have a file I downloaded from EM Client named dbrepairrebuildall.exe. 

If I recall it manually rebuilds the database and fixes any problems. Is this correct? And should I use it when there’s a time when I’m not using EM Client, if I cancel a database rebuild?

The repair application that runs on start is C:\Program Files (x86)\eM Client\DbRepair.exe. So you can run that at any time, so long as eM Client is closed. The application you downloaded can also be run at any time. Find a time when you are not going to be using eM Client, and do it at least once.

If those don’t help, and you continue to get the crash, you would have to start with a new database. As it appears your accounts are setup as POP3, so everything is stored locally, you would have to export all your data, create a new database, then import the data back again. A restore will just put the dodgy database back in place.

So does DbRepair.exe and the application I downloaded do different things and it would be worthwhile to run them both and see it it improves the crashes? My database is large, 33 gigs. I’ve gotten crashes for the last 1.5 years in every version and I’m running the current version.

 I assumed it was because I have a large database from Live Mail and Outlook Express before that. It seems this new version of EM Client is a little better with the crashes as the previous ones.

I get a few different types of crashes: Sometimes EM Client just freezes and usually I’ll get a MS messages asking me to either wait or close the program. Other times EM Client just closes by itself after I do something minor. Each time it wants to rebuild the database, sometimes I let it. I think I get about crash a week and I use it every day, pretty often

IN my situation do you think using the export and import method to rebuild a new database would fix the crashes?

Yes, as far as I know, those two applications do different things.

33 GB is quite large, so the export and import is probably going to take a while. Fortunately folder structures will be maintained, so it is just the time you need to find. It is up to you whether investing that time and maybe finding a fix is better than weekly crashes.