Solved How clean up a messed up outlook .pst file: delete 'wrong' duplicates?

[WimYogya]

Strange things happened with the contacts section of my outlook .pst file.
Various contacts suddenly missed their NOTE field.
Stranger even: when I activated a much older backup of the .pst (of which I was sure they were correct the same contacts missed the same note - whereas others still HAD the note, in both the old and the current .pst.
Already was busy trying to re-create lost information, but... after a computer shut down due to an Indonesian powercut ALL notes were suddenly back - as if nothing had happened.

But another mystery had happened.
The 'recovered .pst' file suddenly had MANY MANY duplicate contacts, that is: identical twins but also semi-identical twins (for instance one field empty or an old address or different categories). My idea is that two versions of .pst have 'merged', with older and newer versions of the same contact.

Now the question...
Is there a way to filter ALL duplicates and in such a way that the OLDEST version is shown first and the NEWEST version is shown last? Then - after verification - I can more easily delete the 'wrong' duplicates than doing it manually one by one. Not nice, with 1300 contacts.

Hope my problem is clear.
A solution would be very welcome.
Thanks,
Wim

 

[Ranger4]

Have a look at this Microsoft website for a possible solution to your problem.

Repair Outlook Data Files (.pst and .ost) - Outlook

 

[WimYogya]

Scanpst.exe did the trick. After that the mess was gone. Just had to re-write ONE record that apparently had frustrated the rest.
Thanks for the suggestion!

 

[Ranger4]

You are welcome & thanks for getting back. Good to hear that it seems fixed.

Could you mark the thread as Solved, please.