Solve MS Access Error – Broken Reference to the File

Error in MS Access (Broken Reference to the File…): Emergence of an error message that states, “broken reference to the file…” when you access your Microsoft Access database can happen due to many possible reasons. Some of them are as follows:
• Virus infection in the system
• Abrupt system shutdown
• An incompatible database element
• Importing invalid database component
• Corruption in the Operating System
• Software malfunctioning etc

Data Becomes Inaccessible: When the above-mentioned error appears on your screen, it can cause inaccessibility of your Access database and therefore, your valuable data can be at stake.

What Exactly Happens: When you attempt to import a database component from a previous MS Access version (say 2003) to a newer MS Access version (say 2007), you will encounter the error message stating: “Your Microsoft Access database or project contains a missing or broken reference to the file version.” After such error occurs, your Access database is forced to shut down unexpectedly. When you attempt to re-mount it, you will not be able to do so. Further, the database becomes inaccessible & unmountable.

Solution Steps: To solve error broken reference to the file, follow the following steps:

• Use Backup: You can recover your Access database contents from an updated backup. However, if such updated & valid backup is not available, then you can go for other recovery methods.
• Re-create Relationships: You would need to repair or recreate the corrupt Access MDB database relationships.
  

o In case of small database: You can easily and quickly recreate all the relationships.
o In case of large database: You cannot recreate all the relationships again. In this case, you have to Compact Access database, which can be done with the help of a third-party Access recovery tool. SysTools Access Recovery software is one such tool. It has been found that many users have been successfully using this product for Access database recovery. So this software can perhaps be the perfect Access recovery solution for you to fix broken reference to the file error.