The process of making a connection between Outlook and Exchange can sometimes be problematic. Sometimes the network is not up or the connection information for either the client or the server may have changed or become corrupted.

When unable to make a connection between the client and the server a variety of error messages can be displayed: some alone and others in combination with each other. One such error message that a user or administrator may see displayed is the following:

“Exchange is currently in recovery mode. You can either connect to your Exchange server using the network, work offline, or cancel this logon.”

There are a couple different reasons for this message as well as multiple solutions. Most of the time the error message is displayed because of a difference in the cached copies of the mailboxes stored on the local client and of the cached copies stored on the Exchange server. This problem can be resolved by disabling the cached Exchange mode on Outlook, restarting Outlook and then resetting the cached Exchange mode on Outlook back to enabled status.

The “Exchange is currently in recovery mode” can also indicate that there are configuration issues with the Domain Name System (DNS) settings. This could also be the result of a connection problem either on the client or on the server. And it could also mean that the DNS server itself is down and thus not providing name resolution services.

Continue reading How to solve the Exchange in Recovery Mode Error