I have Outlook Express 5.0 running on Windows 98 (but do not know whether 5.0 was upgraded from 4.0). For some reason, Outlook has started to display attachments in the message box. I have found a reply that you made to this query in November last, and attempted to follow the registry editing instructions for a solution. I went to Regedit and navigated to HKEY_CURRENT_USERIdentities{……}SoftwareMicrosoftOutlook Express5.0 where there are a number of sub-folders. Choosing mail I entered a new DWORD value ‘Automatic Inline Images’ but the problem persists. The value shows as a string of zeros, but I am unable to alter this to a single ‘0′ even by double clicking on the string to edit it. Is this OK? I am also unable to determine whether my mail format is HTML or Plain text. Where do I alter or check on that, please?

If the value for ‘Automatically Inline Images’ is not present when you first viewed Outlook Express in the registry, it is most likely that your copy of Outlook Express was not upgraded from 4.0. However, as mentioned in the November column last year, by creating the value yourself, it will have the same effect. The reason this is not working for you is because you are putting the DWORD value in the wrong location and using the wrong name. Firstly, you have put the value in the Mail subfolder. If you put it in there, it will not work. You have to put it in the 5.0 folder. Even though there are subfolders (such as Mail) off the 5.0 directory, you can still put registry items in the 5.0 folder. So, go back into the registry and delete the Automatic Inline Images reference you put in the Mail subfolder. Now, click the 5.0 folder. You will see quite a few registry values appear in the right-hand pane. Right-click in some white space in the right-hand pane and select ‘New’ > ‘DWORD value’. Change the name of this value to ‘Automatically Inline Images’ (NB: Automatically NOT Automatic) - you can change the name by right-clicking on the value and selecting ‘Rename’. Now, double-click on the value and ensure that the ‘Value Data’ is set to 0. Click OK. Don’t worry that the ‘Data’ for ‘Automatically Inline Images’ is displayed as 0×00000000 (0) - this is the hexadecimal display of the binary number 0. Regarding your second query, you can check your mail sending format by going to the ‘Tools’ menu in Outlook Express > ‘Options’. In the window that appears, click the ‘Send’ tab. There you can see and change your mail sending format under the ‘Mail Sending Format’ heading.