"Identity Switch Canceled

Question

I just upgraded from Vista to Windows 7 32 bit. After the upgrade, every time I open Outlook 2007, I get an error popup that says. "Identity Switch Canceled. The current identity could not be changed because one of the applications was unable to switch. Close any open dialog boxes in other applications before trying again."

I was not getting this error prior to the upgrade. I tried removing office and reloading it, without success. I read some things on line about that error in Outlook Express, but I've never run Outlook Express.

The on-line stuff that I read had some instructions for using regedit, but the entries I am supposed to change according to those posts don't exist in my registry.

Any suggestions? Thanks.

Answer 1

Yes, I knew about the Microsoft support document; the instructions there did not solve the issue. But I messed around with regedit a bit. There was an entry for "Last User ID" which was populated with all zeros. I changed the entry to equal the value in HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Identities (including the curly braces at each end), and that did it.

Answer 2

The curly brackets are the key. Steps I used to fix this problem in Outlook 2010:

1. From the windows bubble thing, search for "regedit" and choose it from the menu when found. Mine had a little broken brick icon.
2. Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER in the file structure on the left. Under Identities there is a folder with a really long alpha-numeric name in squiggly brackets. Click on or highlight it and look in the right window. 
3. I did not see "User ID" in the right window, so I figured this was the problem. I right-clicked in the window and selected 'new>string value' and then typed that alpha-numeric name with the squiggly brackets as the the value. When done, in the right window you should see User ID under the column Name and the alph-numeric string under the column Data.
4. Close Outlook and re-open.

Answer 3

You could refer to the article below. The article speaks about outlook express; however you could try the steps mentioned on Windows 7.

Disclaimer: If you use Registry Editor incorrectly, you may cause serious problems that may require you to reinstall your operating system. Microsoft cannot guarantee that you can solve problems that result from using Registry Editor incorrectly. Use Registry Editor at your own risk

****Visit the link below for more information on registry back-up: http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/Back-up-the-registry

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/224463

Answer 4

"weasel_atty" wrote in message news:c298b305-3707-4f51-9d1b-c21dea1b6733...

I just upgraded from Vista to Windows 7 32 bit. After the upgrade, every time I open Outlook 2007, I get an error popup that says. "Identity Switch Canceled. The current identity could not be changed because one of the applications was unable to switch. Close any open dialog boxes in other applications before trying again."

I was not getting this error prior to the upgrade. I tried removing office and reloading it, without success. I read some things on line about that error in Outlook Express, but I've never run Outlook Express.

The on-line stuff that I read had some instructions for using regedit, but the entries I am supposed to change according to those posts don't exist in my registry.

Any suggestions? Thanks.

All updates for Office 2007 are installed? Did you try a new Outlook profile? Control Panel ->icon view -> Mail....

If you start Outlook in safe mode, any difference? Hold ctrl while clicking on the shortcut to Outlook.

If you add another user account to Windows and set up a new Outlook profile for that user. Any difference?

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Gérard