Outlook, OneDrive and shutting down

[rdjohn]

No matter how little I use Outlook, closing down my laptop always says that OneDrive is updating.

I presume its my .pst file which is large. Is there a simple way of preventing this?

I don’t use my Outlook on any other devices, so can I select certain files not to go to OneDrive?

Thanks for any advice

[Mr Pointy]

Are you sure it's a .pst & not an .ost? A .pst can be moved (Control Panel>Mail) but you can only set the .ost location when initiallt setting up Outlook, depending on which type of Outlook it is of course.

[rdjohn]

Thanks,

I am using Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2019. I have previously used several versions from 2000 onwards, the last being 365 that did use a .pst.

I was encouraged to use OneDrive as a backup after I installed and ever since I have this issue while trying to close down.

I will have a check though

[rdjohn]

Just had a look, OneDrive has 2-files

Outlook POP .pst = 12.7GB, and
Archive.pst = 10.4GB

both of them were updated yesterday as I closed down at 16:53.

Any ideas? Can I stop the Archive, somehow?

Thanks

[theboss]

rdjohn said:

Just had a look, OneDrive has 2-files

Outlook POP .pst = 12.7GB, and
Archive.pst = 10.4GB

both of them were updated yesterday as I closed down at 16:53.

Any ideas? Can I stop the Archive, somehow?

Thanks

Outlook will be opening both files and keeping a lock on both until exiting.

I'd exclude them from the scope of OneDrive's Sync or move them elsewhere.

You could stop using the archive by disabling auto-archive and closing the file, and then keep it in OneDrive.

It's the constant opening / changing / closing of large files that is causing the sync issue as it will be re-syncing them every time.

In a managed OneDrive environment in which pst files are prevalent, it's customary to exclude the file extension from synching.

Edited by theboss on Friday 16th February 13:39

[Mr Pointy]

It seems you cannot exclude specific files from being synced but you can exclude specific file extensions - .pst in your case.

https://windowsloop.com/exclude-specific-file-exte...

Make sure you close Outlook & make backup copies of the two .pst files somewhere outside the Onedrive folder first in case anything goes wrong.

[rdjohn]

Hi The Boss, thanks for the clear instructions. They seem to have fixed my problem.

Kind regards

[rdjohn]

Mr Pointy said:

It seems you cannot exclude specific files from being synced but you can exclude specific file extensions - .pst in your case.

https://windowsloop.com/exclude-specific-file-exte...

Make sure you close Outlook & make backup copies of the two .pst files somewhere outside the Onedrive folder first in case anything goes wrong.

Thanks for your help. I searched Microsoft and their suggestion was to create a folder C/ My Outlook Files and put them in there. Never try to have OneDrive try to store them.

It seems to open up slightly faster and I must be going to save at least 1kWhr in electricity over the year, by not waiting for it to shut down.