Top 6 Reasons for Access database Corruption & Recovery Methods

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Are you using MS Access database to store your data or records? Here you will read about top 6 reasons for Access database corruption & its recovery actions. I think “prevention is better than cure”. It will save your priceless data from corruption that results save money & time. The reasons are:

1. Bad User Action
2. Power Supply Failure
3. Hardware Problem
4. Software Mall-function
5. Disk Space Issue
6. Microsoft Service Pack Issue

Bad User Activity: Turn off your computer or machine without proper closing Access database.

Action: Try to hire trained users who know the result of this and always watch which users have corrupt computer.

Power Supply Failure: It can happen due to several reasons like spark, outage, bad wire and many more.

Action: Make sure your UPS machine or other secondary power supplier is working fine. 

Hardware Problem: In a survey, it is find that 95% of Access database corruption happens due to hardware problem.

Action: Troubleshoot and replace faulty hardware. 

Software Mall-function: Any crash application can crashed your other application like Access database.

Action: Try to remove any unnecessary software from your computer and make sure you have updated latest services pack.

Disk Space Issue: Unavailable space for temp files & folder in your hard drive.

Action: Make sure that your hard drive has hundreds of free disk space.

Microsoft Service Pack Issue: Working on the different service pack may cause of corruption and you may loss some data from your database.

Action: Download & update latest service pack from Microsoft official website.

Note: I hope that all the above described prevention methods are enough to prevent your MS Access database from corruption but in case you will still face corruption then here are some Access recovery tips for you.

Access Recovery Tips: First of all make a copy of your corrupt database before overwriting anything. Now try build-in-repair utility to repair your corrupt database.

For MS Access 2010: Go to the tools ribbon and click on the “Compact & Repair” database. 

For MS Access 2007: Click on your Office button, go with manage and select “Compact & Repair” database.

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Access Database corruption Post Software Conflicts

A program that is installed in your system to interact with host application and perform a specific function is known as a Plug-in, Snap-in, or Add-in. MS Access users use this program to add custom commands and specialized features to save and maintain their database effectively. While installing a plug-in provides lots of benefits, incorrect or incomplete installation can also result into corruption of MS Access database. In such situations, you receive an error message that stops you from accessing the records stored in the database. For systematic access of your database records, a standard way is to restore the records from an updated backup. But, in absence of an updated backup or backup falling short to restore the required data, you will need to opt for an advanced third-party Access Recovery software.


To illustrate this, consider an example where you install a new third party plug-in to improve the performance of MS Access. However, after installing the plug-in, when you attempt to view the records saved in the database, they become inaccessible. Furthermore you also encounter an error message stating the cause for inaccessibility of database records.


Cause:


Few main reasons for the inaccessibility of database records are discussed below:


* Installing a faulty plug-in.
* Improper installation of a plug-in.
* Incomplete installation of a plug-in


Resolution:


To resolve the above error message and to access the database records, you will need to repair the corrupted database using the inbuilt repair utility known as “Compact and Repair”. While the repair utility completely repairs your corrupted database in most of the situations, it fails to repair under below two situations:

* Access database is too large
* Access database is badly corrupted or damaged


If your database remains corrupted due to any of the above situations, then you will need to use a powerful Access Recovery application to repair your database. Such utilities use high end scanning mechanisms to repair your database after any kind of logical crash. These Access Database Repair tools are completely non-destructive in nature and ensure safe recovery of database components.

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MS Access Data Loss after modifying data in some other application

The data saved in the MS Access database files (.mdb and .accdb) contains critical data in the forms of tables, views, forms and more. In most of the cases of opening the database files in other applications, the database becomes corrupt or inaccessible. To conquer such data loss situations, a perfect way is to restore the data from an updated backup. But, in case of absence of an updated backup, you will need to use advanced access repair application that can completely repair the corrupted Access database.

As a practical scenario, you open an .mdb file in the excel application. After making some changes in the MDB file, you save the database at the desired location. However, when you try to open your database, it shows an error message. In addition, the data saved in the Access database becomes inaccessible.

The core cause for microsoft access database inaccessibility is corruption of database due to opening it in another application. To avoid corruption of Access database, you will avoid opening of your database to other application.

To resolve the corruption of MS access database, you will need to use inbuilt repair utility named “Compact and Repair.” To use inbuilt utility, you will need to follow these steps:

1. Go to the Tools menu and select Database Utilities and then click Compact and Repair Database.

2. Locate and then click the database in the ‘Database to Compact From’ dialog box, and then click Compact.

3. Select an appropriate folder location for the new file in the ‘Compact Database Into’ dialog box, type a unique name for the file and then click on Save.

However, if Compact and Repair utility fails to repair the database, then you need to go for efficient Access Repair application. These access database repair applications use advanced scanning mechanisms to scan and repair the corrupted and damaged MS access database files.

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