E-mail disappearing in Mail - reinstall?

I have migrated from Mac Outlook, maninly because e-mail was disappearing from time to time without any reason. Mailboxes was exported from Outlook, and imported into mail. So far so good.

Impressed by the search function.

After some time it seems like the installation has got problems. Search function is 'running wild' - and e-mail starting to disappear.

I thought reinstalling Mail could be an option, but the installastion disc has no option for installation of specific program. Os is 10.6

Would appreciate very much some help to solve the problem.

You shouldn't have emails just disappearing for no reason. Especially not across different applications. I also don't know what you mean by the search function "running wild".

A number of things could be going on here. If you email databases are getting corrupted, then your drive may be failing. See here for tips on checking your drive's health:
http://www.mac-forums.com/forums/os...o-much-space-used-hard-drive.html#post1372971

Once you've checked out the drive's health, you should also run the full suite of maintenance and cleaning tools in Onyx. Perhaps you have a permissions issue or cache corruption.

My other concern is about your statement with searches "going wild". That really needs clarification, but if you mean that the mail apps are randomly searching for content on their own, then short of some weird keyboard malfunction or macro running in the background, someone may be remotely searching your messages and deleting them. But before the tin foil hats go on, you really need to elaborate on this.

Thanks for your help.
Hardware first.
Drive is 500GB, with 250 GB free.

Did a full test with Onyx, reporting errors. restaded computer from installation disk, chose 'Repair' from the disk meny. Repair reportet successful.

Did run a full test with TecTool Pro 6 - reporting no errors.

Did some search tests, but no change.

When searching the inbox for 'postmaster' - it gives 4-5 hits, and lots and lots of completly unrelated hits, as ''phonect', 'fellesforbundet' and 'sigma'. There are no 'postmaster' in heading or body in these email..

The most peculiar is that it is also lots of hits with me as sender - mail from the 'sent' mailbox - now appearing in the inbox with me - the sender - as recipient.

I have found no solution to the problem, that is why i feel it is worth while reinstalling Mail.

Very happy for suggestions.

Well considering that Onyx found some disk errors that required repairing, my best guess here is that your email database is corrupt as a result of those errors. Here's a couple links with tips on repairing Mail issues. One recommends deleting the cache files for Mail. The other shows how to rebuild the database.

Apple Mail problems and how to fix it -
How to rebuild my mail database in Mac Mail?

Thanks for your help. I have run 'Repair permissions' and removed cache files of Mail. I have also rebuild the mailboxes. Still loosing mail. Very serious.Quite a few wanted email has now been marked as unwanted. After performing these tasks, testing search function. No cange - hits are still irrelevant.

I feel out of options, Does making a backup and then reinstalling Mail sound worth while trying? Other ideas?

I'm tapped out for ideas. Unless someone else comes along with a better suggestion, I'd have to say reinstall the OS. With the disk errors you had, it's probably best to do so anyway.

I consider reinstalling. Using Carbon Copy Cloner for a full backup to external HD. Do I have to exclude the Mail application and istall this application separately after reinstall?

Guess mail and settings all are found in the /Library/Mail folder, Is making a copy of this and copying back after reinstall all I need to get my mail back? ?

Feeling very unsecure performing this operation, hope to have some advice.

You can't simply reinstall Mail separately.

I'm honestly at a loss to help you further. I'm not quite sure you understand how to do a proper reinstallation, nor am I certain it will even help you. If everything else is workingin your system, then it may not help. Your email database may be corrupted and a reinstall won't help if you re-import it. I'm bowing out here... hopefully someone else may have better ideas.

Reinstalled OS

Understand your frustration Made successfully a full backup using CarbonCopyCloner. Excluded the Mail applicaten as I assumed problems could be there. Restarted from installation dvd, found disctools an deleted the volume. Understand formatting was also performed in the same operation.

Reinstalled OS from installation dvd and restored backup ok. As you indicated, search function i still weird so I did a scan with Onyx, reported errors again.

It seems like the problem might be found in the Mail folder. Is there a way to save the emails/ mailboxes and possible the account settings, and start from scratch rebulding the Mail folder?

Any other procedures that might work?