Hi,
Need help switching my wife’s Windows Live Mail POP3 folders contents to IMAP.
Never done it.

Her W7 machine is on its last legs and she hasn’t upgraded because she keeps 15 years of emails on her POP3 folders. Tried a few times to switch to Thunderbird but the migration was nowhere near usable. Her WLM is in Spanish and the process has too many wholes in to be usable.

Our local ISP is also a POS, our @fibertel.com.ar accounts bounce back from MS (hotmail, live, outlook, etc) because Fibertel servers are blacklisted. Been like this for 10 years and they don’t give a shit.

Only way i can move my wife to a new computer is to figure out the way to move her emails to IMAP. I understand that means configuring the mail client and somehow let the provider IMAP server to mirror (import) the contents. Or something like that.

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It's been a looong time since I dealt with Outlook (I assume she's using Outlook?), but, IIRC, it allows for multiple email accounts?

If so: You simply set up a new account specifying IMAP, and move her existing email from the old account to the new.

smschulz can certainly be more help than me.

(Btw: If I'm right, and that'll work, I recommend doing the moves or copies in small chunks of no more than a couple hundred at a time. ISTR Outlook struggling copying/moving large numbers of emails in one go. ICBW. Like I said: It's been quite a while.)

Oh... As for the provider doing it: Probably not possible. With POP3 the emails usually exist only on client machine.

Hey Nicky,

Not following the connection between getting your wife a new PC and junking POP3? What am I missing, did 'Windows Live Mail' stop supporting POP3?

I have a bit more than 15 years of history in my POP3 folders - stored on my own drive in Outlook .ost data files - and plan on continuing into the foreseeable future.

TBH, if sidegrading to Windows' latest-and-greatest meant abandoning my email histories, I'd get new hardware that supported the old platform, wipe it to bare metal and reinstall the old platform.

I’m puzzled. You say “she keeps 15 years of emails on her POP3 folders”.

But email is stored in your mail app(s). POP3 and IMAP are alternative download protocols that have nothing to do with email storage.

For me it’s POP3 forever!

quote:

Originally posted by Pipe Smoker:
But email is stored in your mail app(s). POP3 and IMAP are alternative download protocols that have nothing to do with email storage.

Incorrect. With IMAP the mail store is maintained on the server. The client app(s) may, probably do, have locally-cached copies, but, the primary mail store is on the IMAP server.

IMAP is so superior to POP3 in every way I really cannot imagine why anybody still uses POP3

POP3 by default will automatically delete email on the server after downloading from the server.
IMAP email resides on the server.

IF using an email client like Outlook then the process is very versatile.
Email is automatically saved in a PST file that can be easily exported or imported.
IMAP and O365 files are stored via a OST file (similar to PST).


Question:
What is the email client being used? OS?
Will it be the same email address or are you going to use a new email address?

From there we can take a course of action.

quote:

Originally posted by ensigmatic:

IMAP is so superior to POP3 in every way I really cannot imagine why anybody still uses POP3

POP3 is much older and started when space and bandwidth were a premium.
The typical problem was you would always run out of storage space on the server with their limits.
It is why as determined by the client and Outlook for example would delete from the server and download to the client by default although you could configure to leave a copy on the server if so desired.

IMAP came around with the advances in technology of the Internet including HTML browsing, cheaper storage space and faster connections.

To clarify things a bit.

Her email client is Windows Live Mail. No longer supported.
She runs W7, also discontinued.

Can NOT install WLM on W10, it will nuke it at every opportunity. Not a bug, a feature.
So, we are left with current Windows version built in email client or Outlook.

Stopped using Outlook a lifetime ago when the .pst used to hit a wall at 2GB and explode.

Are you saying Outlook is the way out of this mess, avoiding (Windows) Mail client?

If so, how do i copy/move/replicate my POP3 folders (PC) contents at the IMAP (mail server) folders?

Need a way to go from one type (local) folder to the remote equivalent without losing emails and contacts.

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quote:

Originally posted by 0-0:


Are you saying Outlook is the way out of this mess, avoiding (Windows) Mail client?

In a word - yes.

FWIW, the 2GB db limit was many, many years ago and ended somewhere arount Outlook 2000 or 2003 as I recall.

In order to save some time I am pointing you to this video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qESdtf10IP4

In summary you need Outlook installed and configured to your new Email, then open Windows Live Mail, then export to Outlook.
I think it does this directly and no export then separate import is needed.
I almost never used the built-in mail apps and always used Outlook pretty much exclusively in all my clients.
The reason is for situations of migration or maintenance.
Prior there was Outlook Express in XP and then Windows Live Mail and now Windows mail but all have a lack of versatility to them.

Thank you Steve.

Will look into it. Never managed a succesful export/ import between those progrsms. Too many mismatch variables (maybe because non english versions).

We have been through 10+ uninterrupted heatwaves (3 days of temps around and above 100F). Black outs, burn outs, spikes, you name it. Large AC gave up the ghost, fridge was in visible pain barely managing to cool somethings and the PC took a hit.

Unable to install Office, any version, WLM took a hit. Time to abandon ship.

Will pick a W10 machine and try migrating to Outlook.

Thanks


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IMAP gives you more options for how the mail store is managed. Except that, you are beholden to the management practices of your ISP or mail provider. For example, you don't have to worry about backups if your provider is doing them right, but you can never know if this is happening.

Most mailers (e-mail "client" programs) have the option of syncing local e-mail message storage, mirroring that which is on the server. This is not the case with standard POP provision, where as soon as you fetch the message, the server deletes it. This can, and has to me, happened at times when the server deletes the message before the download is complete, and therefore the message is lost.

I know very little about Microsoft's so-called technology, but I suggest investigating an open-source third-party mailer such as Thunderbird. I think there is a Thunderbird "skin" available as an add-on that makes it look like MS Outlook, if that is a barrier.

quote:

Originally posted by ensigmatic:

quote:

Originally posted by Pipe Smoker:
But email is stored in your mail app(s). POP3 and IMAP are alternative download protocols that have nothing to do with email storage.

Incorrect. With IMAP the mail store is maintained on the server. The client app(s) may, probably do, have locally-cached copies, but, the primary mail store is on the IMAP server.

IMAP is so superior to POP3 in every way I really cannot imagine why anybody still uses POP3

Thanks. I’m definitely a POP3 guy and had forgotten most that I once knew about IMAP.

POP3 supports only one email client, and for me that’s the one on my MacBook. But my email service, fastmail.com, has an excellent web interface that I use on my iPhone. Most folks seeing me use it would think it was an iPhone mail app. I use it a LOT more than the MacBook mail client.

I have my fastmail.com service configured to keep emails on the server for 31 days. Every evening I download new emails to my MacBook so they’re subject to my backup process.

My ISP is an eTurd. Has been perfeting the art of incompetence for years now. Not that i have other viable alternatives.

As per responsibilities, they can’t completely dropped the ball last Dec, for a whole week. Still waiting for an apology or even recognition of all that email that got lost forever. December is not an insignificant month, auite the contrary.

When they start taking water and i notice, one of the first things i do is email all my different accounts to and from to check how deep in shit we are. As stated before, been years since i’ve been able to email any MS server without bouncing (black listed) or swallowed by a black hole.

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quote:

Originally posted by 0-0:
My ISP is an eTurd. Has been perfeting the art of incompetence for years now. Not that i have other viable alternatives.

As per responsibilities, they can’t completely dropped the ball last Dec, for a whole week. Still waiting for an apology or even recognition of all that email that got lost forever. December is not an insignificant month, auite the contrary.

When they start taking water and i notice, one of the first things i do is email all my different accounts to and from to check how deep in shit we are. As stated before, been years since i’ve been able to email any MS server without bouncing (black listed) or swallowed by a black hole.

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Just for the record, IMAP and POP are not generally used for outgoing mail. It is possible to do with IMAP, but I don't think I have ever heard of anyone using POP for outgoing.

But Nicky's experience with flakey mail services illustrate the value of multiple e-mail addresses placed with multiple providers. There are enough free providers that this should not be a difficulty even in a tough regulatory environment like Argentina. Even if the providers prefer that you use their webapp, most, if not all, provide IMAP access to the mail repository. I would be surprised to learn, for example, that Argentina denies access to GMail's servers. I understand that many have made a strategic decision to avoid Google-provided services, but there are many competitors who operate at the same price point.

Not mentioned yet, or maybe I missed it, is that IMAP gives you the ability to see the same inbox and server-side folders from multiple apps and multiple devices, where as POP makes this much more difficult to achieve, and maintain. Of course, this also means that the provider has your entire mail history to mine, TANSTAAFL, you know.

quote:

Originally posted by architect:
Just for the record, IMAP and POP are not generally used for outgoing mail. It is possible to do with IMAP, ...

Welll... kind of. Some IMAP servers allegedly have a provision whereby, if you move an email into an "Outbox" folder the IMAP server will send the email. But, that's not really "sending email via IMAP," per se.

That's not what 0-0's referring to, anyway. What he's referring to is his ISP has such a poor reputation for keeping email abusers off their network that some major email providers have blacklisted the ISP.

N.B.: He also noted Microsoft email services dropping email on the floor. This is not particular to his ISP. Microsoft's email services are pretty well-known for this.

quote:

Originally posted by architect:
But Nicky's experience with flakey mail services illustrate the value of multiple e-mail addresses placed with multiple providers.

Or just choose one good one

I’m not my wife or asking for a friend

Been using my Hotmail account as Main since 1995. Have others too (Gmail, Fibertel, different name, etc) just in case. Use them a lot less for orher purposes, gaming, android, you name it.
The wife uses her Fibertel.com.ar as her business account probably as long hence the reluctance to change. Understandable but less and less viable.
Not much i can do about it. Been trying for years. Sane with leaving WLM.

For simplicity’s sake, i said POP3 and IMAP, the two options the client programs offer when setting up an account. No point there mentioning SMTP, i think.

You guys got the idea. Shitloads of valuable emails stuck in a local folder of an extinct program. Need to go to IMAP to be able to migrate to another mail client and new OS without further complications. That’s it.

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