Outlook "Signature too large"

MSgherzi · May 18, 2009

I made a custom signature for a customer of mine a couple of months ago and just recently they called me saying that Outlook is no out of nowhere giving them an error saying "Signature too large" and she can click OK and send e-mails, but no signature will be attached. I've searched online and apparently MS actually lowered the maximum size from 300k to like 4k in Outlook. I don't know, unfortunately, what version of Outlook she has, but how do you think I can solve this issue? I don't particularly want to ask others to help me do a job I should be doing, but I don't want to leave her without anything.

When I made the signature, I saved it in an .html file using notepad. Here's the code:

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
<HTML><HEAD><TITLE>Letterhead</TITLE>
<META content="text/html; charset=windows-1252" http-equiv="Content-Type">
<meta name="robots" content="none">
</head>
<body bgcolor="#ffffff" style="margin-top:0px;">


<table align="center" bgcolor="#ffffff" background="bear_emboss7.gif" border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="height:300px; width:390px;"><tr>
<td valign="top" style="padding:0px 0px 0px 0px">
<style type="text/css"></style>
<TABLE border="0" style="width:100%">

<tr><td>
<img src="Terri.jpg" height="200" width="150"></td></tr>
<TR valign="bottom"><TD class="all"><font face="vivaldi" size="5"><b><i>Terri Juergens</a></b></i>   <font size="1" face="verdana">"...on the go, making things happen."</font><br>            <font size="2" face="verdana"><i><b>Broker Associate</b></i><br><img src="bvs_logo2.gif" width="40" height="40"> Bear Valley Springs Realty<br><b>(661) 303-6868</b><br><a href="http://www.bvsrealty.com">www.bvsrealty.com</a><br></td></tr></TABLE>

</td></tr></table>
</body></html>

I remember modifying just the location of the pictures and files after using this code. Otherwise, that's it. My only solution is to try and it out her signature and make a picture out of it and try that (not that I suspect that would be any smaller in file size).

Methical · May 18, 2009

That looks like enough code to run up a small webpage lol

A signature should have no more than 10 lines..

To me, you have alot of unecessary code for a signature..

Keep
It
Simple
Stupid

MSgherzi · May 18, 2009

Methical said:
That looks like enough code to run up a small webpage lol

A signature should have no more than 10 lines..

To me, you have alot of unecessary code for a signature..

Keep
It
Simple
Stupid

What code would you suggest I axe?

Methical · May 18, 2009

<title>
<meta>
and make css external for starters, and see if that helps even a bit..

MSgherzi · May 18, 2009

I think what happened was I made a webpage to see how it looked and forgot to edit it later because idk why I would have left codes like <title> there.

Methical · May 18, 2009

lol fair enough
I was wonderin' the same thing, and could only come up with that conclusion that you did it for testing purposes.

But I still wouldn't know why you would enter it in there knowing full well that it will not show up in the sig.

But all the best in reducing it in size mate, let us know how u get on.

And is it true about this 4kb limitation? Do you documentation to back it up?

MSgherzi · May 18, 2009

Methical said:
lol fair enough
I was wonderin' the same thing, and could only come up with that conclusion that you did it for testing purposes.

But I still wouldn't know why you would enter it in there knowing full well that it will not show up in the sig.

But all the best in reducing it in size mate, let us know how u get on.

And is it true about this 4kb limitation? Do you documentation to back it up?

Honestly, no. I read on Google that from Outlook 2002 to I think 2004 or something they changed it from 300k to 4k, maybe from 2000 to 2002.

I entered that because I was viewing it as a webpage, but you're right, it's a lot of irrelevant code. That doesn't explain why it was working for several months and suddenly stopped, though. It's under 2kb in size so I still don't know why it'd say it's too large, unless the "large" means length in code and not necessarily in file size.

Methical · May 18, 2009

Did anythin' show up at all? Like just text and not images?

Or maybe HTML was turned off in emails?

Where are the images stored anyway? On her email server I'm presuming?

MSgherzi · May 18, 2009

No, they're stored on her computer that she uses at work. And no, after the error came up she can click OK but the emails send without the signature.

SOHO-NZ · May 18, 2009

It's common practice to upload the images in signatures to a webserver.
It keeps the signature much smaller, as you only send the link to the image, not the image itself.

Methical · May 18, 2009

Well, I was beaten to it..

Thats what I was going to suggest..
tinypic or imgbucket would be the ones to source..

How big is the jpg? I'm pretty sure that png is smaller in size..

Methical · May 18, 2009

But the problem about the signature not exactly sending..

Since you haven't verified the version of Outlook yet.. I can't help you out..

But go back to basics..

Strip all the HTML out of the signature, and just start with her name, and send a test email. And go from there...

RiCO · May 18, 2009

Any images used in an HTML signature that are stored locally will be inserted when it's sent, thus increasing the size. The size limit for a sig is 4KB. The HTML code you posted is about 1.7KB. The background image - bear_emboss7.gif (assuming its the same one as on her website) is 3.5KB - so that puts it over the limit. Add on the picture of her and the logo....

A few of my web design clients have asked for similar email signatures and my advice to them is always, as Methical said to you; keep it simple. Remember that by default, images in mails are blocked by clients; and CSS support is somewhat patchy e.g. the background image wouldn't appear in Outlook 2007, but it would in 2003 (http://www.campaignmonitor.com/css/) - so there's a pretty good chance some recipients aren't seeing it as intended anyway.

If it really has to stay as it is, you've definitely got to get the images onto her webserver and then link to them. And give the code a really good tidy

(happy to help BTW, I've lots of experience with HTML email)

Outlook "Signature too large"

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