Outlook 2003 Running More than Once & Not Shutting Down Properly.

Many of us still use Microsoft Outlook 2003 as our standard Email application or client. It works pretty smoothly and does a great job, but I started finding that it was occasionally crashing and generally not behaving in the rock-steady manner I had become used to.

After opening the Task Manager (see other posts) I spotted the problem. Outlook was running in more than one instance! This should not happen and is bound to cause problems and strange behavior. I tried closing Outlook down, but it was still showing as running in the Task Manager!

I closed down the running instances by highlighting them in the Task Manager and shutting them down one by one.

Did it work? For the moment yes, but as the next time I ran Outlook, I looked back in the Task manager, and there was another instance of it running again!

OK, so here’s the fix!

The problem was being caused by an addin that was running in Outlook as the result of installing some other software, and the culprit in this case was none other than another favorite of mine, iTunes!

Here’s how I fixed it:

I opened the Tools/Options menu in Outlook

Then I clicked on the Other tab, and opened Advanced Options:

Then I opened the COM Add-Ins

…and discovered that there was an entry called iTunes Outlook Addin in there, and it was ticked!

I unticked it, OK’d it and backed my way out, and from that point on, Outlook performed beautifully again – in only one instance, and when I shut it down it, it was really shutdown! No longer did I find multiple instances of it running in the Task Manager and no more buggy, unpredictable crashes or behavior. My good old trusty Outlook was back again!

Now I’m not saying that it’s the iTunes Addin that could be causing this to happen in your case, it could be any other addin. Just untick whatever addins are running one at a time, and try it out. Also look in the COM Add-Ins (it’s the button below the Add-In Manager – look at the image above to locate it), and try unticking some of the unnecessary stuff that may be running in there. Just remember unticking something may lead to another Outlook feature not working! You have to try this out by trial and error, unticking and saving one at a time.

By the way, if Outlook is shutting down properly when you close it, it should disappear out of the system tray down at the bottom right of your screen. NOTE: give it a little while to diasppear as it takes a while to shut down.

Here’s where you’ll see the Outlook icon running in the tray (Task Manager is open here, but it needn’t be, if Outlook is running you’ll see the icon down there):

….and here it’s gone from the tray after shutting Outlook down:

Easy fix. Let me know how it goes!