Migrating Thunderbird from XP to Win7

I did a search and couldn't find any threads that appear to address my situation.

I have two PCs runing XP. They share I/O (KVM switch) but I only use one for Thunderbird E-Mail. I am about to install (and connect to a KVM switch) a new PC that comes loaded with Win 7. I tried to find out how to migrate my Thunderbird (Version 31.1.1) to the new PC, by going to Thunderbird Help.

Not very helpful. It basically said that I should use Easy Transfer Wizard on my new Win 7 machine and it would tell me what to do (what files to bring over).

1. I want to migrate the entire application, not just the data files. I have 10 e-mail addresses that I use with Thunderbird.

Could someone direct me to a place that states specifically what steps (1. 2. 3. ...etc.) to go through to accomplish the complete migration?

Thanks.

 

You will need to install TBird in Win 7 and configure all the accounts again as there is no shortcut for this. Are you using POP3 or IMAP for these accounts?

 

Thanks for your quick reply.

POP Mail Server. Don't recall it being called POP3, but it's been when Thunderbird started (20 years?) since I did this.

Most of the e-mail accounts are on one ISP (localnet.com) and one is AT&T (argh!)

What's all the "stuff" about moving profiles that is written in the Thunderbird Help section?

When you say "configure all the accounts again" that that mean I'm also going to lose all the "saved" e-mails in the various folders under the e-mail addy, oh and the address book (or whatever they call it).

Thanks again for sharing your experience and knowledge on this subject.

When I worked for a computer company (15 years ago) we would tell are customers that a migration was equal to 1/2 a fire. Seems nothing has changed.

 

Can't believe I wrote "are" for "our". Sorry.

 

If you have been using POP, or POP3 as it is also known, all incoming mail has been downloaded (removed) from the server and stored in your mail folders on your XP machine. When you start with a new computer you first need to install TBird and then configure each email account you want it to handle. If you configure the accounts as POP or POP3 then any new mail arriving will be downloaded to the mail folders on your new computer, but you will not at that point have any access at all to your previous mail folders as they are still located on the XP machine. I'm sure there will be a way to copy your XP mail folders to your Win 7 and make them accessible but I will need to do a bit of digging to advise you exactly how. POP has been superseded for many years by IMAP and if you were using IMAP your new system, and your tablet or phone would pick up all the same mail as your old XP system and there would not be a problem.

I'll be back when I have some advice for you.

 

Earthling,

Thanks much for all your help and information.

No hurry. I'll have all three PCs (two old XPs and one new Win 7) on a three-way switch sharing the keyboard, monitor and mouse. I won't start using #3 until I've got 1. Firefox working, 2. avast! (virus protection) working, 3. Thunderbird working and 4. ImgBurn working.

I've got 5 external hard drives that I've been using for years so moving other files around is no problem.

Don't have a tablet (and don't want one) and I use my cell phone as a phone. Can't even text with it.

My past is a foreign country (including most of the language). I am a legal immigrant in the country of my birth.

 

Seems to be a five stage operation -

- Find your existing profile

- Copy it to some temporary medium such as a flash drive

- Copy that to a location other than Program Files on new computer

- Install TBird on new computer and configure all required email accounts

- Point your TB profile at the new profile location

There are many, many pages in various stages of outdatedness but I think you wll find this one helpful. Do come back if you run into issues or need further help.

 

Earthling's advice is pretty good, with minor tweakage, and his link is solid advice. I have done this 2-3 times over the years, as I have moved from WinXP to Win7 to Linux, bringing my Thunderbird profile with me, intact!

If you can download an *.exe file and copy/paste, it's actually very easy to do. IMO, the steps are as follows:

- download Thunderbird to new machine
- install Thunderbird on new machine and start Thunderbird to create a new profile; then shutdown Thunderbird; do NOT setup anything in Thunderbird, as it will be a waste of your time; simply open Thunderbird, then close Thunderbird (no need to setup accounts, extensions, layouts, etc..., as they'll be copied from old)
- locate Thunderbird Profile on old machine, which will be named using a random alpha-numeric string with a *.default extension, i.e. a1b2c3.default (Earthling's link will help you find it)
- copy existing *.default Profile from old machine (using flash drive)
- locate the *.default Profile that you created on your new machine (use Earthling's link to help you find it)
- copy your old machine's *.default Profile from your flash drive and paste right next to the *.default Profile that was created in step #2 above (make note of the exact name of your old *.default profile)
- finally, there is a file named "profiles.ini" located right next to your recently created *.default file on your new machine, and your recently copied *.default file from your old machine. Opening this file will reveal a text document that looks like this:

[General]
StartWithLastProfile=1

[Profile0]
Name=default
IsRelative=1
Path=a1b2c3.default

The line "Path=*.default" is referencing the *.default file you created on your new machine. We created this file so the "profiles.ini" file would be generated with this information. Simply change the referenced *.default file name to EXACTLY match the name of your old *.default profile. For instance, if your new Win7 profile is "a1b2c3.default" and your old WinXP profile is "d4e5f6.default", change "Path=a1b2c3.default" to "Path=d4e5f6.default" to point Thunderbird to your OLD profile, with your old e-mails, extensions, layouts, etc...
- save the modified profiles.ini file
- open Thunderbird and verify all your accounts, e-mails, extensions, layout settings, etc... are there as a complete 100% migration!

Depending on your download speed of Thunderbird.exe and the number of e-mails/accounts you're copying over, this can be accomplished in 3-5 minutes!

 

Thanks Hedon James.

I have a question, which is probably a dumb one, but never-the-less.

Where does "all your accounts" come from?

I understand the logic and method (which you describe clearly) of getting the OLD profile "connected" to the new Thunderbird installed on the new PC, but I don't know how to get all the other "stuff" (accounts, saved e-mails, addresses, etc.) into the new Thunderbird.

 

earlier, you posted you had 10+/- different e-mail accounts. All your accounts, e-mails, extensions, layout changes, etc... are stored within your *.default folder. If you click on that folder, you will find more sub-folders, of which some are likely labeled "imap", "imapmail", "mail", "POPmail" or other similar names. By copying over your entire *.default file, you are copying over your entire Thunderbird configuration, as it was in WinXP. When you change the "profiles.ini" configuration, you're telling Thunderbird to "show me the 'old' profile as my default". By copying your *.default folder and changing your profile.ini, everything comes forward to the new machine, as if you had cloned it from the old. Is that what you're asking me?

 

Great! Exactly what I needed to know.

1. Replace the profile created when I install the new Thunderbird (download).
2. Copy the entire file/folder named "Default" to a memory stick and then copy that to the new PC.

Opps -

I did a search of my C: drive for a file with "default" in the file name. Got 380 hits.

These were the file names of the ones that were in Program Files\Mozilla Thunderbird

defaults
defaults (2)
defaults.ini

And in Program Files/Mozilla Thunderbird\chrome\icons

default

And this file in Documents and Settings\My Name\Application Data\Thunderbird\Profiles

ax8j99w4.default

Would you be able to tell me which (if any) is the file that I should copy and paste in my new PC and where I should paste it?

Thanks again for all your help.

In the 30 odd years that I've had a PC (even before they could be attached to the Internet) I have tried to avoid getting down inside the various files that programs used for fear of messing up the application.

Wandering around in the bowels of Thunderbird is a very new experience for me and I appreciate your patience and understanding.

 

When you click on the link I gave you the page opens three quarters of the way down, so scroll to the top and there is a link to finding your old profile.

 

Yes, the link will tell you how to find your profile. Relevant section copied & pasted here:

Based on your previous post, I believe you want to copy ax8j99w4.default
from your old machine to your new machine (assuming it's in the proper path). Paste that file to the appropriate Thunderbird directory of your new machine, right next to the already existing *.default directory on your new machine. The files will be similarly named with random alphanumeric characters, but ending in *.default. Paste (what I assume to be correct) ax8j99w4.default right next to the existing file, then modify profile.ini to point to the pasted ax8j99w4.default file.

This isn't a reflection on you, so much as a comment on me, but I don't know how to be any more clear? I hope this makes more sense for you...

 

Makes sense. I clicked around and found the ax8j99w4.default file. Opened it and found all my mail files so I assume everything else I need (POP and SMTP settings for all my e-mail accounts) are in there and it's the correct file.

My youngest son is coming to visit this week-end and I'll get him to help me physically install the new machine (it's still in the box) using the KVM switch I purchased.

Then when I get time I'll start the migration. BTW, the new PC includes a free 8 Meg memory stick (USB), so Lenovo figured I would need that little file mover.

I'll let you know how it goes, probably sometime next week.

Thanks again for your instruction and patience.

 

Please do let us know. Besides the gratification of helping someone out, it would be helpful for other people who have a similar issue to see a confirmation that your solution was successful. Good luck!

 

I found that comment odd. IMAP did not "supersede" POP; it's just an alternative way of managing email. People who want to download their email to multiple devices and have email synchronized in all those devices need to use IMAP. But, for people who do all their email on one device, POP mail is adequate. Also, not all email providers support IMAP. For example, my ISP does not support IMAP. I do use an email account provided my ISP, along with a few non-ISP accounts, and my ISP does not support IMAP. So, in that case, my options are limited to POP and/or webmail (accessing the account via web browser).

secretcodebreaker, if need any further references, see https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/moving-thunderbird-data-to-a-new-computer

 

Of course you can still use POP, just like you can still use a CRT TV, but the vast majority of ppl have more than one device these days so IMAP is an automatic choice for most. I can hardly believe there are ISPs that don't support IMAP, and I certainly wouldn't dream of using one.

 

Agreed with IMAP settings "syncing" your e-mail between devices. It's my preferred choice also. But many people "set it and forget it" and if you setup the earlier POP protocol, most people don't change it unless they experience problems. But I would also recommend IMAP for setup...besides the convenience of multiple device options, it does add 1 more layer of recovery for corrupted e-mail clients, crashed devices, etc...

However, IMAP does nothing for Thunderbird settings. While IMAP would allow for effortless recovery of e-mails, it does nothing for my tweaked Thunderbird settings, with extensions, add-ons, layout customizations, preferred sorts/displays, etc...

The BEST and EASIEST way to duplicate those settings exactly, is to copy the *.default profile to a new machine, thereby "cloning" your Thunderbird settings forward. If you're just concerned about e-mails, then IMAP is a preferred solution, IMO. If you have POP mails (many still do, especially WinXP migrators), then moving the *.default profile is not only the best way, but often the ONLY way. And even if you have MULTIPLE IMAP accounts, it's probably quicker and easier to copy/paste your *.default profile to a new machine than it is to re-enter your IMAP settings for each account.

But I do agree that IMAP is a better choice for nearly everyone, and recommend that everyone find out their ISP settings for IMAP and use that instead of POP. Good advice Earthling!

 

I would have to a bit cautious about recommending a Thunderbird user, or any email client user to switch from POP to IMAP without further advice. My wife uses Office Outlook and when I moved her from POP to IMAP all her previous emails were locked in her old .pst file, Outlook's equivalent of TBird's *.default profile. She can still access them but they are in separate folders from her IMAP mails and have to be mounted manually in Outlook to be accessible. I have no means of testing this in TBird but maybe you do have, Hedon?

 

I use Thunderbird on Ubuntu Linux. I have indeed changed my POP settings to IMAP, and it does create a new "email folder" for the IMAP version. Once I verified that IMAP was working, I deselected the retreival of POP mails to prevent the deleting of mail on the server, as per POP protocols. After a week or 2 of verifying that IMAP was functioning perfectly, I moved all my old POP e-mails to my IMAP folder, verified they show there, and deleted my POP accounts. I've had no issues, FWIW.

I can't speak to Outlook though. Or Thunderbird on Windows... As a matter of precaution, perhaps the *.default profile could be copied and renamed by appending BAK to the prefix. I.E. save a1b2c3.default as a1b2c3BAK.default. Then if IMAP changes wreak havoc, you could just restore the profile by copying it back and renaming it to its original filename. Might be overkill though?

 

Don't want to hijack this thread but I just tried a bit of dragging and dropping between the old POP folders and the current IMAP folders and that worked fine so I could, if she wanted it, move all her old mail (about 10 years worth!) into her IMAP folders and just delete the old POP account. But she's happy with the way it is, and it would increase sync times so probably best left as is.

Back to the topic.

 

Referencing MY system & ISP again, I have done this also, in order to clean-up appearances and make older e-mails easy to find. I have moved old POP mails to IMAP folders and my old SMTP sent mails to my new SMTP sent mails.

For whatever reasons, the "old" e-mails in the "new" accounts do not sync; obviously IMAP is a download protocol, so that makes sense, but I'm not sure why the SMTP "sent e-mails" don't sync...perhaps some type of POP flag in the sent headers? Dunno...

So you could probably clean up her folder appearances with no ill sync effects. While that would be MY personal preference, my wife prefers to create subfolders for old e-mails she wants to keep, and categorizes them with subject names. She only has the 1 machine, so I can't comment on that sync behavior. BTW, this is another good reason to clone your Thunderbird *.default profile to a new machine: even if you have IMAP settings, old POP mails that were moved to the IMAP account still arent synced with IMAP. After you've converted to IMAP settings, you'd have to send the old POP mail to yourself and your new IMAP account. Then you could get syncs and delete the old POP mails.

OR you could just leave well enough alone and keep it as is! Don't you just LOVE choices?! :-D

 

OK, useful to know that the old stuff wouldn't sync if I moved it, thanks. But changing what she seems quite content with would be all pain for no gain, so no chance

 

After migrating a number of applications, beginning with Firefox, I felt confident enough today to try migrating Thunderbird.

In a word - Success!

Finding my old profile on my WinXP machine and copying it to a flash drive was the easy part.

Finding where to place it "next to the new profile" on the Win7 machine took a long time and many searches, because I had failed to use Help to come to the realization that those files were hidden and that the default was not to show hidden files.

Once I got past that roadblock, it seems that I placed the "old" profile next to the new profile in the wrong place. Can't say for sure how that happened, but after I changed the profile.ini file (another series of searches to find it) and opened it with my text editor, made the change, saved it and started up Thunderbird, I got an error message telling me it couldn't find a profile.

So, I back to searching and (I think) I found the new profile in another location and my old profile wasn't sitting next to it. So I copied the old one next to the new one and tried it again.

It worked. All my e-mail addresses were there, my mailboxes, everything.:cool

I'm a proponent of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" so I'm not going to try to figure out why my first attempt to copy the old profile next to the new one didn't work.

All told, it took about 45 minutes after I copied the old profile to the flash drive. 40 of those minutes were spent wandering around in the bowels of Win 7 trying to find where Mozilla had hidden the the files I was trying to place.

Many thanks to all for the help. I'll be able to sleep tonight.:-D

 

YAY! Thanks for sharing your awesome news! Congrats on gettin' it done!

 

I was premature in my one word assessment - "Success" Everything was fine with all the migrated mailboxes except my AT&T POP mailbox. E-Mails would go into the box, but Thunderbird couldn't get it out. Every time I tried to Get Mail from my AT&T POP mailbox I got an error.

I checked to be sure all the setting were the same as they were on my PC#1 Thunderbird and they were and they worked as before.

Finally had to get AT&T Tech Support (Chat) and she suggested I let her connect to my PC#3 and look things over and test it out. Didn't work for her either and went to web mail and looked at the mailbox contents and it contained all the test messages I had been sending for the past couple of days, which I couldn't retrieve.

Then she went to the Thunderbird settings and made some changes to the POP settings and tested it again. Still didn't work. So she went back and made some different settings to the POP settings, including changing the port number. Finally got it to work. Before I let her leave, I ran some tests and all worked as it should.

So, in keeping with my "if it's not broke, don't fix it" I've kept the setting she entered on PC#3 Thunderbird and didn't change the settings on PC#1, which still works.

I'll leave it to the experienced experts to explain what this is the case. I suspect it's a WinXP vs Win 7 gremlin.

Now I think I can say "success".