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Windows Vista Webmail (OWA) Fix For Internet Explorer 7- Five Step Fix

Submitted by J. Pisano on February 20, 2007 – 11:18 pm Comments

UPDATE: Some of you are telling me that although the
MIME upgrade fixes some of the problems but you are still experiencing
difficulty when sending messages.

This is most likely due to your service (company, etc.) not updating their
exchange server with the ”hotfix”.

“The cause of the problem is due to Internet Explorer 7 in Windows Vista no longer include support for Dynamic HTML Editing ActiveX control, and thus missing a functionality that Microsoft Exchange Outlook Web Access relies on to do HTML editing in Outlook Web Access.”

More information about this here:

http://www.mydigitallife.info/2006/12/09…dows-vista/

and here:

http:/…06e8a-08eb-4976-bc68-a03ebe3a2552&DisplayLang=en

It appears that both the MIME download upgrade and the hotfix must be applied in order for everything to work correctly. If you need access to your email and none of the above is working, the Opera and Firefox browsers are having no difficulty with this problem and are working fine with OWA and Vista (go figure…)
____________________________________________________

You may find yourself unable to compose a new message when trying to access your exchange server via [tag]Microsoft[/tag] [tag]Outlook[/tag] [tag]Web[/tag] [tag]Access[/tag] while using [tag]Internet Explorer[/tag]; however, you can access it with [tag]Firefox[/tag] and the Opera Browsers. If you are having this problem you will see a [tag]red[/tag] [tag]square[/tag] with an “X” in it when you try to [tag]compose[/tag] a [tag]new[/tag] [tag]message[/tag].

I found this problem to be quite frustrating and found very little information about it on the web. Thus, I am posting the answer here on http://www.mustech.net

The original conversation I had with about this subject may be found on http://techrepublic.com.com and found here: Link to thread and the solution was provided by David.

Error Seen with IE7:

The Solution:

1. Slide down the left Task Pane and Click on “options”.

2. Slide down to “E-mail Security” and Click Install or Upgrade the S/MIME Control. This will download a new add-on.

3. Click “RUN” when asked about the Microsoft Outlook Web Access S/MIME install and security warning.

4. Close and RESTART IE7

5. Go back to your Web Access Site (webmail program) and select “New” to begin composing a new message. The program should now be functioning normally and the red “X” should be gone.

Good luck! Your Comments and Suggestions Welcome!

~J. Pisano

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Ricky

I am student of XXXXXXXXX in Singapore, I am using Windows Vista. I'm uable to create a messageas it shows an "X". But am unable to follow te steps you have publicised. In the pageof the options, itdoen't appear the Email Security section, hence, not able to downoad the required installer. How can I download it? Do reply to my email at XXXXX. Thank you very much.

Dr. J. Pisano

Ricky,

Are you using IE7?

Joe

Godofhell

Did you actually try sending. I downloaded the active X control and when I press the send button the browser closes all the way out and restarts. I downloaded firefox for now.

Jason

My Options doesn't have anything about Email security, just two optionsaout displays when notification arrves. I'm running IE7, too.

Ricky

ya..IE7 windows Vista

Dr. J. Pisano

Ricky & Jason,

I am not sure as to why you don't see this after clicking the options tab in the left pane. It is possible that the tab is disabled by the security administrator. Anyone else?

J. Pisano

Ricky

anyone has the link todownload the activeX control? perhaps may like to put it here?

Dr. J. Pisano

Jason & Ricky,

This is from our Network Engineer: Jim S.
It may give some further insight:

Joe:

With regard to your thread at:
http://www.mustech.net/2007/02/windows-vista-we...

I believe that the last persons on the thread may be connecting to an older version of Exchange Server OWA...
---
"One of the new features of Outlook Web Access in Exchange Server 2003 is the ability to encrypt and digitally sign messages when using OWA. In order to do so, you will need to install the S/MIME Control in OWA by downloading it to the computer that you are using.
Note: These features are only available as part of the Exchange Server 2003 OWA, and are not available on previous versions of OWA."

---

Jeff

I thought I left a message but it disappeared.

Dr. J. Pisano

Jeff,

I didn't get any message. Please repost.

Joe

Jeff

I tried again. I had put what I had written into a Word document and pasted it in here. It immediately showed up. It did not say that it had to wait for the moderator. This time I coverted it to a text document and will paste it in. Maybe it will work this time.

I am using Vista and IE7 on a new notebook. When I tried to install Update for Exchange 2003 (KB 911829), it ended with an error saying not enough storage. My hard drive shows tons of free space. Nevertheless, I was able to install the mime in OWA. The red x is now gone. However, when I click send IE7 crashes with this data:

Problem signature:
Problem Event Name: APPCRASH
Application Name: iexplore.exe
Application Version: 7.0.6000.16386
Application Timestamp: 4549b133
Fault Module Name: StackHash_8d13
Fault Module Version: 0.0.0.0
Fault Module Timestamp: 00000000
Exception Code: c0000005
Exception Offset: fc458b1c
OS Version: 6.0.6000.2.0.0.768.3
Locale ID: 1033
Additional Information 1: 8d13
Additional Information 2: cdca9b1d21d12b77d84f02df48e34311
Additional Information 3: 8d13
Additional Information 4: cdca9b1d21d12b77d84f02df48e34311

Jeff

For some reason if I paste in my comments that I saved into a document it will not properly post. I will type it all in manually this time.

I am using Vista with IE7 on a new notebook. When I tried install the Update for Exchange 2003 (KB911829), it ended up say that there was not enough storage. My hard drive shows tons of space available. Nevertheless, I was able to install the MIME in OWA. The red X is now gone. However, when I click send in OWA, IE7 crashes with this data:

Problem signature

Problem event name:

Jeff

I accident hit submit.

Some additional info:

Problem event name APPCRASH
Application name: iexplore.exe
Fault module name: StackHash_8fd13
Exception code: c0000005
Exception Offset: fc458b1c

Along with some additional information.

Dr. J. Pisano

Jeff,

I believe what you have downloaded is the server fix. This has to be installed on the server side. It appears that you installed the MIME update correctly but the HOTFIX to the server hasn't been installed yet. If this is the case, then you will be able to now see the WSYIWYG editor and the RED "X" will be gone AND you will be able to enter a message, but it will crash everytime you press send...

J. Pisano

Jeff

Okay, thanks. I guess I will have to wait until they fix things on the server side.

Later,
Jeff

Dr. J. Pisano

Jeff,

I found all of your comments that were "not working". Askimet marked them as SPAM and moved them into the Spam Box. MS WORD hidden characters must have looked like SPAM to the filter. At least that solves that mystery.

Joe

Chris

Joe et al.,

We appled the hotfix to the Exchange 2003 server. Also installed the MIME control as you indicated. This solved the little "x" problem, but now iexplorer.exe crashes everytime you press Send or Save, just as other users have described on this thread.

Dr. J. Pisano

Chris,

Well, I have to tell you I'm not sure why. Try posting over here at Microsoft Technet, They have a long line of comments about this.

For some reason it almost seems to "arbitrarily" work for some and not others. If Firefox and Opera were smart they would be putting out ads like "Hey Look, Our browsers work with Vista and Micrsoft's Own product doesn't", this very issue may double or triple the amount of people torqued about IE7.... Maybe I should change the title of this post to "Possible 5 step fix"...

http://forums.microsoft.com/TechNet/ShowPost.as...

Joe

Dieter Karner

Hi Guys,

you don't need firefox. IE7 will work as well, as long as you enter OWA only in basic mode. There are usually 2 options during logon: premium or basic. Basic looks just like in firefox and provides the ability to actually send mails.

Br
Dieter

Dr. J. Pisano

Hello all,

I believe what Dieter is suggesting is something that ONLY can be done on the server side. So those of you who don't control that will not be able to take advantage of this good advice. However, you can pass it on to your admins...

For more information about this check here:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/aa996007.aspx

Joe

P.S. Any other good ideas, post them here!

Daniel

Yes, this is the best website I could have checked on. My problem with Outlook Web Access has been fixed, and the update for MIME was just beautiful. Thank you.

Dr. J. Pisano

Daniel,

Well, People Keep On coming here, for whatever reason... I'm glad we were able to help you. Most people don't post so I'm not sure whether or not their problem was fixed! Glad to have helped.

Joe

mat w

Cheers mate - nice article!

Tapsa

So if I have same problem with exchange 2000, I will be in trouble:

Sad to say that fix for exchange 2000 webaccess is hard to get. You have to pay for it. I know who will get that money...

Not so easy to pass this to admins, if I'm the admin! In this moment, I haven't found solution to this problem, firefox isn't one, because is drops hmtl away from replied message, using plain text instead.

Rieke

For me (Vista IE7), unfortunately the solution of upgrading the S/MIME did not pay off. However, I do seem to have resolved red x problem by rnning the "basic" version of OWA, rather than the "premium" version. I do hope the people at MS wake up soon, because I hate the look and feel of the "basic" version! Franly, I find it incredible that this compatibility issue has come up in the first place.
Thanx for all your help.

Dr. J. Pisano

Reike,

I agree, I have no idea "what" microsoft was thinking when they left this out of the "quality check". You can use Firefox and Opera with Vista Premium and it will work. Best of luck!

J. Pisano

Steve

I am running Vista on a client , switching to basic is a good workaround to use owa,,,,This does not have to be selected on the server.

thanks good luck

Spm

this issue sucks..not always you can have the freedom to contact the server guys to install a patch there just because you are using Vista, and no one else around..esp. most of might be using Vista at Home and XP at office. All woes start from there. Sadly, I am still finding it hard to make the server admin do about this.

Spm

Guys, this is for sure that the fixes on both ur m/c and the server wont guarantee a success..somehow, we need to wait till most of the machines start working in Vista. Then, microsoft also will get more bangs from many more corners. Anyways, to somehow get ur job done, only sure and easy option is to use "Basic" mode..i guess most of you might agree that it is really irritating to work with the "basic" mode, but cant help! even i am bearing with that..

:)

:)

Vengaayam

:grin:

Bart

Hello everybody,

I found a very simple solution for this problem. At the 'log in screen' you can select 'Basic' instead of 'Premium'. If I log in on this 'basic mode' I don't have this little red cross anymore and can send mails again without problems. Hopefully this is a good tip.

Greets, Bart

Andy

When I click 'download' in the E-mail security section in the options folder, I receive an 'error on page' warning. An ideas what is causing this?

Cheers in advance

Andy

Debbie Z

I did the install in OWA in the security section - the X is gone but now it crashes when I hit send. Guess that's not an worse than not being able to reply.

Dr. J. Pisano

Debbie,

Read through the above comments, you will find that the problem is now not on your end but that of your network administrator. They need to install the proper exchange patch(es) to make this work as well.

Regards,

J. Pisano

Flemming

Thank you for the advise. J. Pisano on the 5 step. It worked great. However, now when I open an e-mail (new or reply) or decide to close it without doing anything it will shut down IE7 automatically. Has anyone experienced the same problem? Is there a fix or what might cause this?

Looking forward to any feed back you might have. Thank you.

Flemming

Dr. J. Pisano

Flemming,

Thanks for the post. Please read the above comments as your question has been been addressed by some others.

To All,

Thanks for your posts, If you have anything to add please feel free to do so. I plan on "getting" back into this issue in detail this week to see what has been accomplished by Microsoft. It's been long enough.

J. Pisano :razz:

Tony N

Great advice in all the above. Fixed that unpleasant little red cross. Selected Basic instead of Premium --- Things worked great until I tried a few days ago. Now it's back to restarting IE7 whenever I press send. I did notice a Vista update taking place, not sure if this had an effect or if I've lost a fix somewhere.

Tony

Tere

Muchísimas gracias por ayudarme a resolver el desagradable error de la X roja, no podía contestar a nadie. Saludos desde Madrid.

ValClark

Awesome fix! Glad I checked your website in my Google search. The Mime update did the trick for me.

Thanks!

Dr. J. Pisano

ValClark,

Glad it worked! Everyone else, please don't forget to check through the comments here, others have left some great advice as well...

Joe

Anonymous

The fix didn't work for me. the browser crashes in premium mode (haven't had the update added to the server yet, but based on the feedback here, I'm doubting that will help).

Anonymous

Your fix worked for me. Thanks much.

Small Kent

My problem is cannot logon OWA in Vista :oops:

Dr. J. Pisano

Small Kent,

That is uncharacteristic of the problems discussed here. Check with your administrator...

Regards,

J. Pisano

Anonymous

this is a nice helpful site thank you

Stacey

Hello, My mother has a new comp that came with Vista. She uses Outlook, with a dsl wireless connection. When she attempts to Send/Receive in Outlook it asks her for her password(connection to internet)when she is already connected. I have gone into the folders and made sure that it doesnt prompt her, but it still does. As well as when she finally gets logged in and there is email..it sends 2 of everything..Vista is a pain..im so use to XP! Any ideas on how to get her to use her email easier??

Thanks

Smitty

A similar problem occurs with IE7 on XP where you can't see the persons signature and if you install the S/MIME update all it does is crash IE7 everytime you try to use it. So far, I have seen no fixes, but if anybody has any ideas, I'd be happy to hear them. The only thing I know for sure to work is to take off IE7 and you have no problem.

Lone Raver

Very easy to solve - Just down load and use Firefox

Mango

I hit this problem, read all the posts, cant get my work sys admins to bite on the patch, so resorted to Firefox. I must say that this is a very painful solution as manuvering around webmail with firefox is dreadful. I'm sure i'll lump it but easy to solve for poor usability is hardly a fix.

Savoi7

It work thank you very much.
Another problem is that I cannot install Office 2003 on my new laptop, that have Vista, it tells me that I'm missing
MSVBVM50.DLL
Could you help again.
SAvoi7
Thank you

Dr. J. Pisano

Savoi7,

Check out the MS support article:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/179492

Regards,

J. Pisano

Vikas

Excellent, worked like a charm

moebius

Hi there,

quite interesting: I work for 2 companies. After having chnaged to vista, outlook did misbehave in the way it is described above (red cross) when I called OWA from the one company. I tried to install the smime with the result, that the browser crashed.

Well, I changed to the OWA of the other company an the IE7 told me, that my smime had been out of date. So I said: ok, install the new one.

After having done this both (!) OWAs worked fine without having performed the server which caused the problems ;-)

Oh Happy day.... :-)

Dr. J. Pisano

Moebius,

That is crazy! End result...it's working!

J. Pisano

Don T.

I found a very simple solution for this problem. As Bart noted above, At the ‘log in screen’ you can select ‘Basic’ instead of ‘Premium’. If I log in on this ‘basic mode’ I can send mails again without it crashing and losing my e-mail I typed. This is a rally good tip.

Thanks, Bart! Don

Birdy

Hi !,

I'm a client (USE OWA of IE7 on Vista and faced this problem of red cross at the left top of editing screen.
Can u show me the screen how change Mode from Basic & Screen.

If possible I would like to know the process of fixing this problem, such as :- how to update MIME and etc.

Tks.

DeadMan

dont work for me :neutral:

help me plz

ArNoZ

Hi there guys, firstly, I am glad to know that I am not the only battling with something as silly as this.
I just want to check, if anyone manage to get it OWA in Vista working with a Exchange 2000 server?
Cheers

Emma

Hey there - I thought FANTASTIC when I got this tip: it did work indeed in that I could reply/compose (ie enter text) in the body of the email.

However, when I hit "send" - IE7 throws me out of the company webmail site and reloads (not on the site).

When I go back into the company webmail, the email is neither sent nor in outbox.

Help?!

Emma

As an addition to my post #60, I now because of MIME install can't even forward the email without it booting me out of IE7 and reloading to defuault site. Which is even less ideal (and the uninstall doesn't work via control panel because an error message comes up saying that the MIME is already loaded and I can't reload) - GAH!

Dr. J. Pisano

Emma,

This fix is a "two process" fix. First, you have to make sure that your exchange (email) provide has applied the hotfix as well. Email, phone, or text them to make sure that they have applied all of the server-side updates. My guess is that they have not followed through with this as of yet.

If you absolutely need email now, the firefox and opera browsers work with OWA, regardless of this "mess".

Best regards,

J. Pisano

Emma

J, you are very, very helpful thank you! I am using Firefox now as the company is to review the impact of adopting the fix on its server. I'm not convinced that that decision will be made quickly, so your tip on Firefox is perfect. Thanks very much!

Lisa

Had the same problem. Very, very frustrating. Things seem to work ok when I choose Basic vs Premium. Is there a way to go back to Premium, and not have IE crash? That is, undo the download?

vivian

My daughter got a new HP Pavilion laptop that has Windows Vista on it about 5 months ago. We have a wireless system that we are using on two of our computers including hers. Her internet was working fine until a couple of days ago but now when she tries to sign on to Internet Explorer to get on the internet, it keeps coming up with "This page can not be displayed, therefore, she can't get on the internet. We have called HP, our internet provider and our wireless provider & no one can help us. Do you have any idea what might be going on. We don't know where to turn to now.

Dr. J. Pisano

Vivian,

Sorry for your problems. There a are literally hundreds of scenarios that could be a problem for you. If you would like help with this, please sign up for our forum and post under COMPUTER hardware, taking the time to detail information about your Network setup, proxy information, and events that lead to the problem. I'll be happy to help you through some of the scenarios.

~J. Pisano

brodiemac

CRAP!!! I just tried this and it worked until I tried to send the very large email I had just typed. IE crashed and I lost everything. Damn Microsoft for not fixing this after seeing post about this as far back as 2005. Yes, the proper patches have been applied to the excahnge server. I know this because I have applied them. I think we'll just scrap the OWA server in favor of the Citrix environment we just deployed. More $$$ down the drain for Microsoft for not addressing the most basic of issues.

Jubei

Hi, I followed all the steps above.
When I compose a new msg, it is ok.
However, when I click reply or forward the existing msg, it will take over 5-8 mins to load the msg box out? Is there anyway to load it faster?

Jubei

Hi, one more question is that after the msg box come out, when I close it and the whole webmail will be closed as well. May I know how to solve this problem?

mariail

When attempting to download the MIME update I am receiving the same ‘error on page’ warning referenced in post #34 by Andy. He was never responded to. I was just wondering if you had any ideas about the cause of this error message and what can be done to overcome the issue.

Thanks In Advance

Juantana

Hey guys - good advice.. I hate to even mention it, but my company (the Federal Gov't!) - uses... *shudder* Lotus Notes Web Access! the only reason I mention it is I have exactly the same issue when replying or creating or fwd-ing, the red x and I wonder if there would be a similar fix for my issue - maybe install the MIME directly? Anyhoo, thanks!

Mitch

I tried the updat, and I can noew view and type a return email or a new one, but when I hit send the screen whites out and IE 7 re-starts. Any Ideas?

Many thanks in advance!

deepak

It sounds funny, microsoft products are not compatible with each other. Looks like IE7 was not tested on Vista with Web outlook. What a miss.

My company did mention that they have no plans to install hotfix on exchange server because officially they are not supporting VISTA.

I started using Firefox and now will continue to use it even if microsoft fixes this problem by provide activeX control again in IE7.

It is fast ... ok not so fancy but I like the simplicity.

Mariail

I wish that I could find the "simplicity" likable. It just feels like I have been relegated to using a broken product that I have to tie together with shoestrings to try to get it to do kind of what I want it to do. My biggest problem is that I had already created a rules based folder structure and in Firefox I cannot even access the folders that I created. This makes replying to anything that doesn't land in my primary inbox impossible. I am forced to cut & paste in an effort to replicate what a reply or forwarded message should look like. Oh of course then there is the fact that I cannot use my stored signature.

I have had a Vista laptop for about 3 weeks now and have overcome every other glitch that presented itself except for this one which is the only one that involved a problem between 2 Microsoft products.

My company is trying to fix it for me but they are not having success. They have upgraded to SP2 and still when they attempt to install the hotfix it is giving them a message telling them that they must be running SP2 or higher. I am going to encourage them to post what steps they have taken on this board in hopes that someone can present a solution. On my end I am still getting an error message in my IE status bar when I attempt the S/MIME control download.

fozzie9605

Joe,

Awesome site and great fix. My wife has been frustrated that working from home meant reading her e-mails then responding through yahoo mail (time consuming and annoying). Now all is well and IE7 isnt crashing here so good luck to everyone else and keep it up Joe. :-)

greddo

Good information and a partial fix for me.. I completed the S/MIME download and it rid me of the red 'X' when trying to reply, compose or forward a messege however IE7 crashes everytime I press send. I will be asking some questions tomorrow in hopes of a solution. I do not know if my company will attempt to fix it because Vista is not supported as far as I know.

Andy

Great. Works. Done.

greddo

The response I got from the IT department.

"Non-fixable bug for the time being, we already have the hotfix
installed, Microsoft is aware and working on it."

eggman

what's the link to the hotfix? maybe you should leave a link at the top, or make it step 6.

Deependra

Dear Pisano, I followed what you recommended to get away from this problem, i could edit/reply/compose new mails now but the moment i click on "Send" button, IE7 hangs and there's no choice but to kill the application. Am i missing something, Please suggest. Please mail me at deependra@beesys.com if you can.

Thanks for your support.

Regards,

Deependra

Dr. J. Pisano

Hi guys,

It's been awhile since I've replied to this long thread. My advice is to read through the comments on this thread as most of the re-occuring questions have already been addressed.

J. Pisano

Justin Jacob

well, Microsoft being such a huge company and this problem of webmail crashing being seen commonly, I wonder why MS has not taken additional steps to save the time and resources of its customers. I am sure that the volume of people harried by this would be in many thousands and MS seems to have got no news about it yet...Strange, is it not????

Tony

I have been trying all the solutions and it doesnt seem anything works.

I did IE8 beta and it still crashes the mime active x control.

Any other idea's?

Michael

I've been looking to fix this issue for weeks and couldn't find anything on the Internet to help me. Thank you -- this WORKED!

May your deity heap many blesses on you for this.

Michael

Carmencita Albamino

These guys from Bicester Computers have found a simple solution.
I have personally tried it and it worked for 3 dif VISTA - IE7 and IE8 systems
make sure you read until the end:

http://support.bicester-computers.com/showthrea...

Thanks

Pittsburgh

dude.. you rock.. i've been trying to fix this for months !!

Donna

You are a genius! Thank you Thank you. the pictures showing the step by step solution was wonderful. Thank you so much!

Sean

I have a little bit of info to add. I recently bought a new computer with Vista as OS. My Microsoft Outlook Web Access worked perfect until I downloaded Openoffice.org. That's when all my problems with the Outlook web access started. I tried the fix above and I had all the same problems. My first fix seemed liked it worked but when I hit send IE7 closed and restarted. I can now send email by logging in as "basic". I wonder how many of the people above have installed Openoffice.org on the PC's? Is it a coincidence or could it be the root of the problem?

mutu26

In this situation advise try-password recovery tool pst,because this tool helped me many times and as far as i know it is free,program will help you to retrieve account details and service information, when necessary,can recover your forgotten password in several seconds,tool features a powerful algorithm, that permits to sorts all characters, including even multilingual alphabets and Unicode and composes another password for you, that will be accepted by Microsoft Outlook,will work under all supported versions of Microsoft Windows and Microsoft Office.

Alex

It was great. It started working.
Your suggestion was really helpful.

larry

I installed S/MIME Outlook Web Accesson my Vista laptop and I was able to type a reply to an e-mail however once i click on send Outlook Web Access closes and the e-mail is not sent. any thought?