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Windows 11 version 24H2 has a pretty hefty list of known bugs and confirmed issues. One of the latest additions affects customers with Outlook and Google Workspace Sync installed (an app for managing emails, calendar events, notes, contacts, and other data in Outlook). According to Microsoft and a new support document, Outlook might fail to start after installing Windows 11 version 24H2:
After installing Windows 11, version 24H2, you might experience issues while starting Microsoft Outlook if you are using Google Workspace Sync. You might observe that Microsoft Outlook fails to start, and you are unable to uninstall or reinstall Google Workspace Sync.
Resulting from this issue you will observe an error which begins with ‘Cannot Start Microsoft Outlook. Cannot Open the Outlook Window. The set of folders cannot be opened. An unexpected error has occurred. MAPI was unable to load the information service’.
Not only that, the operating system won't let you uninstall or reinstall the Google Workspace Sync client. As it usually goes in scenarios like this, Microsoft applied a "compatibility hold," preventing affected customers from updating to Windows 11 version 24H2.
Fortunately, if you are affected, there is no need to wait several days for a fix.
Users can resolve the problem by updating to the latest version of Google Workspace Sync. You need to install version 4.3.68.0 and newer before attempting to update to Windows 11 version 24H2. Those updating with the Media Creation Tool app will be prompted to take action during the installation process.
Note that it might take up to 48 hours for the update block to lift on your system. Microsoft says that those who cannot update after installing the latest version of Google Workspace Sync should contact Google's official support. Also, only client versions of Windows 11 version 24H2 are affected, and Outlook should work without issues with Google Workspace Sync on previous releases.