Outlook 2010 complaining about missing Outlook.pst

Question

Since I wasn't using Outlook.pst (or so I thought), I decided to delete it. Oops.

Now Outlook 2010 is complaining every time I open it. How can I remove all trace of it?

Here's what Control Panel > Mail shows me:

Here's the error message when I try and remove trace of the missing file:

You cannot delete this Outlook data file. Configuration information in the file is being copied to your new default data file. You can delete the file after this information is copied.

Considering the Outlook.pst was only 26k, I have no idea what it's doing now.

Here's the error message I get when I open Outlook 2010:

The file C:\Users\Poo\Documents\Outlook Files\Outlook.pst cannot be found

Yes, I'm an idiot for thinking Microsoft would have built in failsafes for such an event.

Answer 1

Can't you un-delete it?

Easiest and simplist solution is to probably repair Outlook and then remove the invalid .PST from the Data Files (if the repair doesn't).

My next step (if the repair didn't work) would then probably be to copy an empty/blank PST and rename the copy to the old PST's name and dump in it in the old location. Obviously with Outlook closed! When you then reopen it Outlook can't complain the file isn't there...