Sharepoint 2007 alerts – within Outlook 2007 / Exchange 2003

I’ve been having a problem with viewing “alerts” received from Sharepoint-2007 – with Outlook 2007 showing a blank preview pane, and a messagebox on double-click – simply stating “Cannot Open Item”.

It’s a Microsoft Exchange 2003 issue :

•	You have a mailbox on a server that is running Microsoft Exchange Server 2003.
•	You use Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 to send a notification message to the mailbox.
•	You try to open the SharePoint Server 2007 notification message in Microsoft Office Outlook 2007.
•	Outlook 2007 is running in Cached Exchange Mode.

In this scenario, you cannot open the notification message in Outlook 2007. 

There is a Microsoft hotfix – for Exchange Server 2003 >

You cannot open a SharePoint Server 2007 notification message in Outlook 2007 when your mailbox is on an Exchange 2003 server

Turning OFF “cached” mode for Exchange 2003 fixes the problem !    My laptop is configured for cached Exchange Mode – as the SDM Exchange Server is located in Adelaide (about 800 km away).

 There’s a great post from Kathy Hughes re: Cached Exchange Mode – which fixed my laptop, but made it run rather slow.  I think I’ll cope with the “cannot open item” message box – until the Exchange server hotfix has been applied.