Vista - Probelm in MSN Contact List

Respected sir

i am using Live messenger on a Vista Business PC.
i am facing the problem of multiple entries in my contact list. for example
if i type the name "Amanda" in my list , actually there is only once contact
with that name , but it shows me 3 or 4 contacts with the same name and
ID.But only one of them shows online when the contact is actually online.
this case has happened with almost my all contact list. i have a contact list
of 300 but now it shows a list of 1500 contacts.
and when i log in from my id from a system which is using XP and using same
version of messenger the contact list shows only 300 contacts
Please Guide what needs to be done.
i have also formated my system 3 days back!
please reply on atishkapur@xxxxxx
Regards
Atish
if reqired i can sedn a snap shot of it also

Greetings Atish,

It's possible that on the other PC you have Messenger set to show you only Messenger
contacts, but on this new PC, you've not toggled the same option.

To do so, open up the main Messenger window, press the Alt key to bring up the menu bar,
choose Contacts, then Filter Contacts and then choose Messenger contacts only.

--
Jonathan Kay
Microsoft MVP - Windows Live Messenger
MSN Messenger/Windows Messenger
MessengerGeek Blog: http://www.messengergeek.com
Messenger Resources: http://messenger.jonathankay.com
(c) 2008 Jonathan Kay - If redistributing, you must include this signature or citation
--


"Atish Kapur" <Atish Kapur@xxxxxx> wrote in message
news:538A335A-E2F0-4C3A-95BC-4CFEDD1B56CF@xxxxxx

Try the following:

a) Use your Internet browser to log on to your hotmail account - via
the Hotmail webmail interface at www.hotmail.com.

b) Click on "Contacts".

c) If the contact list contains duplicates, click on "Options"
(below the top right hand corner of the screen)

d) On the Options menu, scroll down to "Customize your Contacts" and
click on "Clean up Duplicate Contacts".

e) The wizard will generate a list of all duplicates. Click on each
name in turn. You must decide whether to delete or merge the data for
each duplicated name.

f) Once you have completed the cleanup, exit Windows Live

g) Sign out from Windows Live Messenger. Then sign in again.
Windows Live Messenger will re-import your contacts list and this time,
there should be no duplicates.

Duplication seems to occur, if you try to add a contact via the Windows
Live Messenger window and/or via the Windows Live Mail program - and the
same name is already recorded elsewhere. For the future, I have found
that the best way to prevent duplicates is to use the Hotmail webmail
interface only, every time you need to make all add or delete a contact.



"Atish Kapur" <Atish Kapur@xxxxxx> wrote in message
news:538A335A-E2F0-4C3A-95BC-4CFEDD1B56CF@xxxxxx

greetings Mr Kay And Mr Lucas

Really thank both of you for your reply
but the problem is more than what it seams
http://picasaweb.google.com/atishkapur
on the attached website i have posted the screen shots of my hotmail contact
lst and my msn contact list
my list on hotmail contact hows ard 500 contacts bt on my msn it shows 1500
contacts
my contact list has automaticly broken into pieces.. you can see in the
pictures .. one list has broken into many. and some contacts get repeated in
the list.
also there is a list of othr contacts where all the contacts are again
present there also.
i have tried to do what both of you said ..
when i did what mr Kay said .. nothing major happened
when i tried to do whatmr Lucas said it just found 3 duplicate cntacts

then i tried to log in from my messenger on a Xp computer ,
it showed me the proper contact list(no duplicates) .. but now just a
problem has come that my groups have become empty and all the contacts have
gone ito all contacts and match the same number as per the hotmail contacts
screen shot.
i guess to make my contact list ok i need to restettle them again
Please guide and tell mewhat needs to be done
incase more screen shots are required please inform me i will sned it to you
Bregards
Atish Kapur

"Jonathan Kay [MVP]" wrote:

greetings Mr Kay And Mr Lucas

Really thank both of you for your reply
but the problem is more than what it seams
http://picasaweb.google.com/atishkapur
on the attached website i have posted the screen shots of my hotmail contact
lst and my msn contact list
my list on hotmail contact hows ard 500 contacts bt on my msn it shows 1500
contacts
my contact list has automaticly broken into pieces.. you can see in the
pictures .. one list has broken into many. and some contacts get repeated in
the list.
also there is a list of othr contacts where all the contacts are again
present there also.
i have tried to do what both of you said ..
when i did what mr Kay said .. nothing major happened
when i tried to do whatmr Lucas said it just found 3 duplicate cntacts

then i tried to log in from my messenger on a Xp computer ,
it showed me the proper contact list(no duplicates) .. but now just a
problem has come that my groups have become empty and all the contacts have
gone ito all contacts and match the same number as per the hotmail contacts
screen shot.
i guess to make my contact list ok i need to restettle them again
Please guide and tell mewhat needs to be done
incase more screen shots are required please inform me i will sned it to you
Bregards
Atish Kapur



"Bob Lucas" wrote:

Unfortunately, your screen shots were not very clear - so I can't draw
any conclusions. All I can do is to tell you about my own experience
(which might not be the same as yours) and the way I resolved the
problem.

I have a laptop computer and a desktop computer. The operating system
on both machines is Windows XP. My primary email client has always been
Outlook Express.

I have had a Hotmail account for many years - and I created a short
contact list (via the Hotmail webmail interface). Windows Live
Messenger has always used the same contact list.

Several months ago, Microsoft advised me that I would no longer be able
to use Outlook Express to access my Hotmail Inbox. Consequently, I
installed Windows Live Mail on my laptop - and subsequently, on my
desktop computer. That is when my problem started.

During the installation of Windows Live Mail on my laptop, the program
imported the entire contents of my Windows Address from Outlook Express.
It also signed into my Hotmail account. The next time I checked the
contact list in Windows Live Messenger, I discovered that every contact
from my Outlook Express address book had been added to Live Messenger.
That created many duplicates in my Hotmail contact list.

The same thing happened, when I installed Windows Live Mail on my
desktop computer. This time, it created triplicate entries in my
Hotmail contact list.

I tried editing the various lists - which did not resolve the problem
because every time I opened Windows Live Mail on either computer, it
synchronized the various contact lists.

I eventually found a permanent solution to the problem:

1. I signed out of Live Messenger and closed the program on both
computers.

2. I signed out of my Hotmail account (via the webmail interface) and
disconnected both computers from the Internet.

3. Then, I opened Windows Live Mail on both computers. Without an
Internet connection, Live Mail could not sign in to my Hotmail account.
I deleted my entire contact list from Windows Live Mail and on both
computers - and closed Windows Live Mail.

4. I reconnected one computer to the Internet and signed into my
Hotmail account via the webmail interface. Then I used the contact
management wizard to remove duplicate contacts. Several contact names
disappeared from the Groups - so I had to edit the Groups. I saved the
changes and rebooted both computers.

5. Following the re-boot, Windows Live Messenger signed in and
imported the master Contact List from my Hotmail account - without any
duplicates. Similarly, Windows Live Mail imported the same contact
list - without duplicates.

The entire exercise was time consuming - and there may be better ways of
synchronizing the various contact lists. However, I have experienced no
further problems with duplicate contacts.



"Atish Kapur" <AtishKapur@xxxxxx> wrote in message
news:5BFFF312-919F-4BCB-AD27-E39781B2C58D@xxxxxx