MS 2003 server crashed, outlook won't open
 

Hi All,
Several months ago the server at work crashed. Though I could not recieve new emails, Outlook still opened and I could access old emails in my inbox. A new server was installed running on Server 2008. The IT guy attempted to rejoin my laptop to the new server and determined that It couldn't be done since I was running media-edition XP (Through a little research on the net I discovered that this can be rectified by making some registry changes but that's another story) After the IT guys attempt to join my laptopo to the network, when I tried to open outlook I would get a dialog box asking for a password to get on the network. Since I did not have an account on the new server I would hit cancel (in the hope that I could work offline) I now get the message cannot find server etc and set of folders could not be found and exits. The IT guy says that my profile was on the old server and thus without it the application won't open.
I don't know what happened other than I was able to open outlook for a week when the old server was down and now I can't. What do I have to do in order to open outlook and view old emails?

Thanks in advance
sf65740