Office 365 has broken my Outlook

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I run Outlook from a hosted exchange server. It is working just fine on my main computer and my Apple phone, but I also have it installed on a Dell Ultrabook (XPS11). I am also using Office 365 on this machine. All was (relatively) well until the middle of last week, when Outlook disconnected from my Exchange server and refused to reconnect. As far as I could tell, this was an upgrade to Outlook 2016 that caused it to break.

Reading various forums I found I was not alone in this issue. In fact Microsoft now puts a disclaimer on the Office 365-2016 install page that says that it does not work with Outlook!!! Don’t you just love it?

Anyway, based on experience from others I removed Office 365-2016 and reinstalled the 2013 version. However, my Outlook (now 2013) still will not connect to the exchange server – it sits there for the longest time with the little dots rolling across the screen, before giving me a message that says “The connection to Microsoft Exchange is unavailable. Outlook must be online or connected to complete this action”, even though the computer is connected to the internet.

I have tried removing the profile and re-assigning it, all to no avail. I can see an OST file in the appropriate folder but it is empty (zero K).

All suggestions will be gratefully received.

Many thanks

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I would check to see which Windows and Office updates were installed (and maybe any other updates) right before the failure occurred. Make note of them, uninstall them, and then reboot, to see if Outlook now works. If it works after doing that, then you know that one (or more) of the ones you uninstalled was the culprit.

Make sure you do a backup of your system before doing this.

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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Thanks Jim,

The only update around that time was KB3035583 – the Windows 10 nagging update! I have removed that but it did not solve the problem.

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I know now it’s too late, but removing Office 2016 is probably not the way to go. I had a different problem with Office 2016 and solved it by stopping updates and reverting to a previous Office 2016 version. This link explains how to do it, at the bottom of the article:

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3145116

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I tried to follow the instructions but there is no .exe file in the Clicktorun directory. Also, I’m using Office 365 Home version, not pro.

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I tried to follow the instructions but there is no .exe file in the Clicktorun directory. Also, I’m using Office 365 Home version, not pro.

The advice is for Office 365 Home, which is what I have installed, as well. I cannot explain the absence of the file, though. Have you tried opening a command window, and pasting the full command line there and then executing it?

“C:Program FilesCommon FilesMicrosoft sharedClickToRunofficec2rclient.exe” /update user updatetoversion=16.0.6366.2068

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Even though there is a C:Program[space]Files directory, when I paste this into the run line I get an error that says “Windows cannot find C:Program”

Keith

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Can you provide a link to the page with the disclaimer?

If Outlook 2016 connection to Exchange was working and then failure, the failures are often because of an issue at the Exchange server. Sometimes a firewall change can be a problem. Did you try any of the suggestions at Fix Outlook connection problems in Office 365 and Exchange Online?

Joe

--Joe

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Hi Joe,

There is no link to the disclaimer, it shows up when you try to do an install for Office 365-2016 (home version).

As I said at the beginning, Exchange is working just fine on my main PC (running the full version of Outlook 2007 as part of the Office Ultimate suite), and also on my iPhone, so I do not think this is an Exchange problem.

Furthermore, I cannot connect with this Ultrabook at a number of locations (work, home, hotel, etc..) so I do not think it’s a network firewall issue. I have also tried turning off the internal firewall (Norton 360) to no avail.

I tried the link to the page you suggested. The auto fix link sends me to the sign-in page for office school or work versions. I have the Home version, so I cannot login with that link. Looking at the manual options, all my windows updates are current, and trying to run the profile repair from the Mail link on the Control Panel page just results in the same problems I reported at the beginning.

Keith

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Did you include the double quotes at the beginning and the end of the first bit i.e. “C:program files ….exe”?

Eliminate spare time: start programming PowerShell

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Did you include the double quotes at the beginning and the end of the first bit i.e. “C:program files ….exe”?

Yes, you absolutely need to include the quotes!

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I’m not sure if I am helping, but I am running Outlook 2016 from my MSDN subscription (part of Office 2016) and it works fine with Office 365.

Alan

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