Question

Import Outlook Express store into Thunderbird or Windows Live Mail

Asked by: geistman

My hard disk crashed (thanks to the creator of the Vitro malware). I was using Outlook Express In WinXP and I have a complete backup of the OE store on an external hard drive (thanks to UBCD4WIN). I have installed Windows 7 on a new computer and am trying to decide whether to use Windows Live Mail (WLM) or Thunderbird (TB). I would be interested in hearing any informed opinions as to which would be the better choice. Most important though, is,  for either app, how do I go about importing the emails and contacts directly from the Outlook Express store into either WLM or TB? I read that TB has a built-in import facility for OE, but will it work on a system that does not have OE installed? What about WLM -- does it have an OE import facility, and if so, will it import directly from the store? One last comment: my inbox has a quite extensive set of sub-folders; when I import to either app, will the folder structure remail intact, or will this cause any additional problems?

Thanks in advance for your advice.

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Asked On
2009-08-08 at 17:52:03ID24637580
Tags

Outlook Express

,

Thunderbird

,

Windows Live Mail

,

Import

Topics

Thunderbird Email Client

,

OE-WindowsLive

Participating Experts
2
Points
200
Comments
5

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Answers

 

by: eviningPosted on 2009-08-08 at 18:41:10ID: 25052403

normally u can tell TB where to look for the import identity, WLM prob has the same feature
i havent used livemail yet, TB is is nice with some of the extensions u can add to it making it more like a PIM, with calendar, task reminders, and notes
also u can use a program like MiTec Mail Viewer to export ur saved emails to .eml format which should be easy to import
http://www.snapfiles.com/get/dbxviewer.html

 

by: ElrondCTPosted on 2009-08-10 at 08:06:46ID: 25060589

Thunderbird's import options are described at http://kb.mozillazine.org/Thunderbird_:_FAQs_:_Migrate_from_Outlook_Express

The page includes options if you don't have OE installed on your computer. One of the options it lists is to use WLM to serve as an intermediary for the import process, so clearly WLM does import OE files. I used WLM just briefly when I moved to Vista before dumping it in favor of TB (in part because I needed to keep several email addresses separate; WLM forces all mail to be kept together, which Microsoft claims is an improvement but made it unusable for me), but my recollection is that it kept the folder structure that I had in OE. TB definitely does.

 

by: geistmanPosted on 2009-08-11 at 05:23:05ID: 25068143

Thanks to you both -- I will award points shortly. I tried doing the import in Thunderbird, and it let me designate where the OE store was located. Worked like a charm! But ...

I can't say the same for my old OE Address Book. I put a copy of the WAB on the desktop and asked TB to import it into contacts. Quickly got the message that TB could not find any address books. It did not ask where the file was located. Is there a specific location that the WAB file should be put for TB to find it, or is there some parameter in TB that can be edited to specify that it should look on the desktop?

 

by: ElrondCTPosted on 2009-08-11 at 07:01:13ID: 25069120

The standard location/name for the OE address book in XP is C:\Documents and Settings\<user>\Application Data\Microsoft\Address Book\<user>.wab (where <user> is your user/account name). I don't know if TBird on a Win7 installation will look there or in a different place. I don't know of any way to tell TBird to look someplace different. A quick look through the Config Editor for anything with "address" doesn't show anything useful.

 

by: eviningPosted on 2009-08-11 at 07:02:12ID: 25069136

there is another prog like MiTec that will list ur address book named WABMail
http://www.snapfiles.com/get/wabmail.html

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