Vista - "Find" in Windows Mail stopped working - esentutl /p says file locked or in use

In Windows Mail, when either a mail or newsgroup folder is selected, the
Find function (Edit, Find) never finds anything.

This problem mysteriously appeared a few days ago - I'm reasonably certain
it did work before.

For example:
1. open Windows Mail
2. select this newsgroup (microsoft.public.windows.vista.mail)
3. click Edit, Find, Message
4. in "Subject" key the word - how -
5. click Find Now
6. observe that the "Find Now" button gets enabled again immediately, but
nothing appears in the bottom part of the Find Message window

The use of the command 'esentutl /p" to repair the Windows Mail database was
described in earlier posts in this newsgroup and it fixed a different
problem I had earlier, so thought I would try it again.

1. restart the computer
2. logon with an administrative user account
3. key esentutl /p "U:\DataLocal\WindowsMail"
4. after a few seconds I get this response:

Extensible Storage Engine Utilities for Microsoft(R) Windows(R)
Version 6.0
Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Error: Access to source database 'U:\DataLocal\WindowsMail' failed with Jet
error -1032.

Operation terminated with error -1032 (JET_errFileAccessDenied, Cannot
access file, the file is locked or in use) after 30.47 seco
nds.

5. key the command esentutl /r "U:\DataLocal\WindowsMail"
6. almost immediately, get this response:
Extensible Storage Engine Utilities for Microsoft(R) Windows(R)
Version 6.0
Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Initiating RECOVERY mode...
Logfile base name: U:\DataLocal\WindowsMail
Log files: <current directory>
System files: <current directory>

Operation terminated with error -1003 (JET_errInvalidParameter, Invalid API
parameter) after 0.15 seconds.

So, what do I have to do to get the Edit, Find to work and to get the
esentutl commands to work?

By the way, if I key things (e.g. how) in the Search field in the Windows
Mail button bar, the list of messgaes is filtered to show only those with
that text in their Subject.

--
Bruce Sanderson MVP Printing
http://members.shaw.ca/bsanders

It is perfectly useless to know the right answer to the wrong question.