Cannot open database “. It may not be a database that your application recognizes, or the file may be corrupt.

Question

An Access 2007 database that we recently constructed started giving the following error message when we try to enter attachments, "Cannot open database “.  It may not be a database that your application recognizes, or the file may be corrupt." 

I since became aware that there is a 2 gig limit on table attachments and that apparently is what is causing the error message to appear.  We are right at the 2 gig limit.  Our anticipation was that this database would store approximately 500 gigs of attachments.  However, I can not find anything that tells me an alternate way to  set up the database to store and retrieve document attachments.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Answer 1

I had the same problem, i found if you run "compact and repair" which can be found in:

Tools > Database Utilities > compact and repair database

it reduced the size by over 100% and it worked completely fine after that!

Answer 2

Go for click and Tools > Database Utilities > compact and repair database

Answer 3

Sounds like corruption...  (In your case because of reaching the limit)

http://www.granite.ab.ca/access/corruption/symptoms.htm.

I would make a back-up, make another back-up and then first try importing all but the tables that contain attachments into a new database.  Also, read this article...

http://www.granite.ab.ca/access/corruption/retrievedata.htm.

And after all of that I would finish off with this article...

http://allenbrowne.com/ser-25.html and see if any of those circumstances apply to you.

And when all else fails…

Data Recovery Services (I have never used them but I see them most mentioned when trying to recover data)…

http://www.pksolutions.com/t4.htm

There is nothing aside from upsizing that will allow Access to go beyond its limit.  Which is why most would store only a path to the picture/image and the actual picture/image in a folder in a central location.

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Gina Whipp

Microsoft MVP (Access)

Please post all replies to the forum where everyone can benefit.

Answer 4

If you have reached the limit, Gina is right it may not be recoverable.  But you might consider moving to SQL Server 2008 Express (10Gb limit) and perhaps using SQL Server Migration Assistant (SSMA) can move it over even at the file size you currently have.

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Bob Larson, Former Access MVP (2008-2010) http://www.btabdevelopment.com (free Access tools, tutorials, and samples)

Answer 5

An Access 2007 database that we recently constructed started giving the following error message when we try to enter attachments, "Cannot open database “.  It may not be a database that your application recognizes, or the file may be corrupt." 

I since became aware that there is a 2 gig limit on table attachments and that apparently is what is causing the error message to appear.  We are right at the 2 gig limit.  Our anticipation was that this database would store approximately 500 gigs of attachments.  However, I can not find anything that tells me an alternate way to  set up the database to store and retrieve document attachments.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Here is a link to a sample database that stores pictures outside the database and stores the links to the pictures in the database.

http://www.rogersaccesslibrary.com/forum/topic298.html