Updated: 2009-04-09

In some circumstances, you might need to restore a group of users to a previous installation of Microsoft Outlook after an upgrade to Microsoft Office Outlook 2007. To do this, you remove Office Outlook 2007 and then reinstall the previous version of Outlook. You must also re-create the users' Outlook profiles.

NoteNote:

This topic is for Outlook administrators. To learn more about uninstalling Office Outlook 2007 on your computer, see Install or remove individual Office program or components.

Removing Office Outlook 2007 and reinstalling another version

If you installed Outlook as part of the Enterprise Edition of Office, you remove Outlook by using the Office Customization Tool (OCT). In the OCT, you can select Outlook from the list of options and set Outlook's feature installation state to Not Available to uninstall it. More information about the OCT is available in Customize the 2007 Office system.

NoteNote:

If you installed Outlook from a standalone product CD, you must run Setup with the /uninstall command-line option on each computer to uninstall Office Outlook 2007.

To remove Office Outlook 2007 by using the Office Customization Tool

  1. From the root of the network installation point, run the following command line to start the OCT: \\server\share\setup.exe /admin.

  2. In the Select Product dialog box, select Microsoft Office Outlook, and click OK. Or, if you want to modify an existing customization file, click Open an existing Setup customization file, click OK, and select and open the customization file you want to modify.

  3. In the left pane, select Set feature installation states.

  4. In the right pane, expand the Microsoft Office tree and navigate to Microsoft Office Outlook.

  5. In the right pane, change the installation options for Microsoft Office Outlook to Not Available. You can prevent users from reinstalling Outlook by also selecting Hidden and Locked. The application name displays as [H] [L] Microsoft Office Outlook.

  6. When you finish making your customizations, select Save in the File menu if you modified an existing customization file. Otherwise, select Save As... in the File menu, specify a unique name for the file with a .msp file extension, and click Save.

  7. Deploy and apply the Setup customization file (MSP) to users' computers.

When you have removed Office Outlook 2007, reinstall the previous version of Outlook. As part of the installation, configure new profiles for users: for example, by setting options in the Custom Installation Wizard or distributing a PRF file.

Affect on Outlook settings

Settings that you specify in Office Outlook 2007 are not retained when you revert to a previous installation of Outlook. Outlook settings will revert to default values or will be set as they were before you installed Office Outlook 2007 (depending on the setting).

Rules are saved in the Outlook store and are not affected by uninstalling and reinstalling.

Affect on PST files

Outlook Personal Folders files (PSTs) are not affected by installing or uninstalling Outlook.

If users have Unicode PST files and are reinstalling an earlier version of Outlook that does not support Unicode PST files, they can copy the information into an Outlook 97-2002 Personal Folders file. To do this, create a data file in the older Outlook 97-2002 Personal Folders file format, then import items into that file from the Unicode data file. There is no automatic procedure to convert files from one format to the other.

Download this book

This topic is included in the following downloadable book for easier reading and printing:

See the full list of available books at Office Resource Kit information.

See Also