Microsoft KB Archive/252518

= OLEXP: "Unknown Error" in Outlook Express When Accessing a Hotmail Account =

Article ID: 252518

Article Last Modified on 1/27/2007

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APPLIES TO


 * Microsoft Outlook Express 5.5
 * Microsoft Outlook Express 5.01 Service Pack 2
 * Microsoft Outlook Express 5.0
 * Microsoft Outlook Express 4.0
 * Microsoft Outlook Express 5.5
 * Microsoft Outlook Express 5.01 Service Pack 1
 * Microsoft Outlook Express 5.0
 * Microsoft Outlook Express 5.5
 * Microsoft Outlook Express 5.01
 * Microsoft Outlook Express 5.0
 * Microsoft Outlook Express 4.0

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This article was previously published under Q252518



For information about the differences between Microsoft Outlook Express and Microsoft Outlook e-mail clients, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

257824 OL2000: Differences Between Outlook and Outlook Express



SYMPTOMS
When you use Outlook Express to open e-mail in a Hotmail account, you may receive the following error message:

An unknown error has occurred.

An invalid character was found inside an entity reference.

-or-

Header download for the 'FolderName' folder did not complete. Account: 'Hotmail account', Server: 'http://services.msn.com/svcs/hotmail/httpmail.asp', Protocol: HTTPMail, Server Response: 'An invalid character was found inside an entity reference.', Port: 0, Secure(SSL): No, Error Number 0xC00CE50E

After you receive this error message, you cannot download any more e-mail. You can still access the Hotmail e-mail using the Hotmail Web interface.



CAUSE
This issue can occur if there is a damaged message header on the Hotmail server.



RESOLUTION
To resolve this issue, delete the affected message from the Hotmail server. To do this, connect to the following Hotmail Web site:

http://www.hotmail.com

From this Web site, you can read and delete the e-mail messages until the damaged one is gone.

NOTE: There is no known way to determine exactly which e-mail message has the problem.

Keywords: kberrmsg kbprb KB252518

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