Registered: Apr 2002
Location:
Posts: 5

Restoring lost datebook entries?

Three strikes and I'm out?

I think I may have wiped out my datebook entries, and am wondering if there might be a way to restore them.

The cast of characters:
Visor Prism running Palm OS 3.5.2
Palm Desktop 4.0.1
DateBook+ 3.5H
Outlook 2002 at home on Windows 2000
No email at work on Windows 95
Default Conduit (I see PocketMirror? on Outlook)


Here is what happened:

I sync my Visor Prism several times a day with the Palm desktop at work (Outlook not installed there). After a month at work, mid May, I stopped sync'ing the datebook and contacts. I sync the Visor at home once a week, and can see all the entries in Outlook.

My Visor Prism battery wasn't charging, so after reading some usenet postings, I decided to do a hard reboot. I've done this in the past, without losing any data. My first mistake was that I didn't make a quick backup (I figured I had the data at home).

When I next resync'ed, all of my files and applications appeared to transfer, like normal, however, at the end of the hotsync, I got a General Protection Fault on the Visor! I looked, and it appeared all the applications and data were there. I tried it again, and this time I did not get the error (but this was probably my second mistake). It was then that I noticed that I had no data in my calendar or contacts.

No problem, I figured, I'll just restore it at home. I went home, and did another resync, using the normal synchronize option (probably mistake #3). It seemed to take a while updating the datebook, so I assumed that it was adding entries. Wrong! It was deleting them from Outlook!

I had a backup from April, so I used that to restore everything (up to April). The next sync's restored this data to my home computer. I then took the Palm to the office, saw that the work Palm desktop had at least the information till Mid-May, and changed the sychronization settings to synchronize the data,
and got back the data till Mid-May.

So, do you think it is possible to recover the data from Mid-May to July? Does it still exist anywhere? Would Norton find it? When I open Palm Desktop, on either PC, the Open Archive option shows NO date book archives (*.dba) in the datebook subdirectory (program files\handspring\datebook). The archive directory has backups of almost everything BUT the datebook entries. The checkboxes for archiving deleted entries is checked.

Is there hope?

Thanks,
Mark