Outlook Find Stops Working

After doing a few searches (or sometimes just one) in a folder (not usually the Inbox), the Outlook find function stops working (doesn't return any results - and there definitely SHOULD be results!). When the Find stops in this way, clicking the Stop button to end the find also has no effect. The only thing that will stop the find is clicking into another folder - though once done, Find will not work until Outlook is restarted.

I have restarted using the /cleanfinders switch and every other switch I can find that may possibly help. Nothing does help for any length of time, and having to restart Outlook just to search for messages is very tedious!

The setup is Outlook 2003 connected to Exchange 2003. I have also encountered the problem on stand-alone Outlook 2003 (but not on previous versions).

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated - this problem is getting steadily worse, and there is nothing in the Knowledgebase that helps. I use Office Update regularly so know that all hotfixes are installed.

Thanks.

As an additional point, it appears that the problem only occurs on a computer using cached Exchange mode or stand-alone Outlook.

Tested a none-cached Exchange Outlook (set up on a different machine) against the same account and folders, and it worked like a dream...

I have had to write a COM add-in for client's to replace the Outlook built-in Rules Wizard (completely unmanageable if you have a number of rules) - am I going to have to do the same thing for the Find function?!?!