When we are archiving messages in your environment we are removing the original message and replacing it with a shortcut to the item we store in the archive. Archive message shortcuts contain a significant portion of the data from the original message such as the sender, recipient, subject, and body text of the message, but we remove items like attachments and embedded images. Because these items no longer reside in Exchange, the Outlook preview window cannot display these items.
A common misconception of how Metalogix Archive Manager works is that we strip attachments and images from messages, but this is not the case. The shortcut created in the mailbox is a new unique item that is created by the software. This is important to understand as problems opening archived messages are usually reported as problems accessing attachments, but the real problem has nothing to do with the attachments and is instead Outlook not opening the archived message from the archive server.
When a user double clicks to open an archived message, they are redirected using a script to retrieve the message from the archive which contains the complete set of content. The preview window in Outlook is not capable of using scripts, so this only works when double clicking to open the message. You can easily identify messages which have been archived from the Outlook client by looking at the icon for the message, as archive message shortcuts will display a small grey CD icon in the bottom left corner of the message envelope icon.
When configuring the Shortcuts you can specify 2 types or retention for the shortcut.
* Keep for Ever: Will keep the shortcut in the user exchange even if the original email is deleted from the Archive Manager.
* Delete the shortcut after: Will remove the shortcut from the Exchange Server after the specified period of time is completed.
To further assist, here is a link to the Archive Manager manuals which are great resources for understand how Archive Manager works:
https://support.quest.com/metalogix-archive-manager-for-exchange/8.2/technical-documents