Vista - Delete Mail and News Group messages

I don't know how to delete the messages that appear to be stored in the "Search Results In Identified Locations Folder". I would think that eventually they would clutter up the memory and slow things down. Is this true and if so how can they be deleted as there is no Delete button on that screen? Thanks, Charlie

Hi Charlie,

Newsgroup messages you can right click on and mark them as Read. This will get rid of them for you. Regular email messages can be dragged to the Deleted Items folder, right click and click Delete, click Delete X icon, or click Edit and Delete.

Shawn

Shawn: Perhaps I did not make myself clear. I find all of my News Group and Email messages in the Search Results in Indexed Location Folder. That folder does not have a delete button nor a read button when I select the message I want to delete. How can I get rid of that long list of messages in that folder that may be cluttering up memory? Thanks, Charlie

Charlie,

The safest way is to delete them from within Windows Mail as described in my post above. You can manually delete them from within a Explorer window at the location C:\Users\(your username)\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Mail\Local Folders. Emails have the .EML file extension. Newsgroup messages will have the .NWS file extension. You can treat these like any other file. You should be able to click on them to open them in Windows Mail to see what they are to.

Shawn

Shawn: Thanks again. However, as a novice I am lost with your latest suggestion. I don't know what you mean by the safest way is to delete them in Windows Mail (I think they were deleted there already and now appear again in a different folder when I select Search). Is the Search Results in Indexed Location folder the Explorer window you suggest where I can delete manually ? I probably will not be able to do that as I don't know how to go about doing the C:\ stuff. Also, I don't understand what file extensions mean. Thanks for trying to help..I am just not knowledgeable enough to fix this I guess. Charlie

Charlie,

Since you already deleted the messages in the Windows Mail email program, then I would not worry about it. Sometimes it takes the Search Index a little while to catch up to keep current on what you deleted and added since it only runs in the background when the computer is idle. Eventually they will fall off the Search Results. This is the area I was referring to in Explorer to delete manually.

If you want to speed the process up, you can Rebuild the index. See the bottom of this tutorial for how.

How to Use the Indexing Options in Vista

Shawn

Shawn: Great! You are quite helpful and patient I might add. I will certainly try the tutorial items. I will let you know how I make out. Thank you, Charlie

Shawn: Success!!! Your instructions were good and easy to follow. I have solved my problem. Hopefully this will speed things up and not bogg down the system. Many thanks. Charlie

Your welcome Charlie,

Glad to hear it solved your problem. Thank you for the feedback.

You might check out these other tips on speeding up the performance of Vista.

Speed Up the Performance of Vista

Shawn