ARGH... Convert Outlook files to the new MS Mail program?: Off-topic discussion forum: Grassroots Motorsports Magazine

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Sept. 23, 2010 3:23 p.m. wcelliot HalfDork

I really don't like Outlook. Never did. The only reason I ever used it on my home computers was that it intregrated nicely and was free.

So my wife's laptop dies with 6 years of .pst Outlook files on it.

New laptop comes with .. Nothing?!!! I was absolutely stunned to see that MS decided that users no longer needed a mail program.

So after doing osme reading on the MS site, I find that I can download an "Outlook Express" compatible progam called Windows Live Mail. Well, while it may be Outlook Express compatible, it cant handle a .pst file.

Is my only choice really paying for Outlook 10 or some third party conversion program? My wife just needs access to her email archives.... and doesn't really care what program she's using.

Thanks for any advice on an easy conversion method. Bill
Sept. 23, 2010 3:50 p.m. turboswede SuperDork

What version of Outlook did she use previously?

You might find an older copy available used. It can still work on your new Operating system.

Also, look at getting away from Microsoft all together:

http://kb.mozillazine.org/Import_.pst_files

http://www.howtogeek.com/forum/topic/convert-pst-to-mbox

http://marklyon.org/gmail/gmailapps.htm

A Google search of "PST file converter Open Source" comes up with tons of links to different solutions to the problems you're having.

It looks like downloading the free Office 2010 demo will allow you to setup Outlook long enough to allow Thunderbird or Gmail to grab the mail and settings so you can ditch Microsoft Outlook.

In fact ditch all of the Microsoft's Office programs and use Open Office and/or Google Docs with Gmail and/or Thunderbird from Mozilla with Mozilla's Firefox browser. All of the above is more secure, free and information and solutions to them are more freely available.
Sept. 23, 2010 4:02 p.m. Dr. Hess SuperDork

I prefer Forte's Agent.
Sept. 23, 2010 4:14 p.m. Grtechguy SuperDork

Get mozilla thunderbird.
Sept. 23, 2010 4:16 p.m. BoxheadTim Dork

@wcelliot - are these Outlook Express files or Outlook files?

For the latter, check if you've got a copy of MS Office floating around somewhere...
Sept. 23, 2010 4:27 p.m. wcelliot HalfDork

Outlook (.pst) files. I have three versions of MS Office available to me, but none appear to have Outlook with them.

I've used T-bird before; didn't know it could import from Outlook.

Thanks for the advice! Bill
Sept. 23, 2010 4:58 p.m. wcelliot HalfDork

Tim had the easy answer... there was indeed an Outlook 2007 on my Enterprise 2007 disk... thanks guys!
Sept. 23, 2010 6:16 p.m. stuart in mn SuperDork

A google search on "importing outlook files to windows live mail" appears to turn up a couple explanations on how to do it.
Sept. 24, 2010 2:04 a.m. heyduard New Reader

Look out! Outlook pst files are prone to corruption at the max of 2 gb. be sure to have back up copies. keep a check on the size of the pst. of course, my info may be outdated, but my wife lost years of emails and contacts when the pst went bye bye; running the repair utility just deleted the corrupted stuff.
Sept. 24, 2010 1:20 p.m. turboswede SuperDork

heyduard,

they fixed the size limitation on PST files created under Office 2007 and later. The drawback is that files created under older versions of Office do not automatically update when opened in Office 2007 or 2010. They need to be recreated (move the data into a newly created PST) and then compacted.

BTW, PSTs are really just flat database files, which is why they are prone to corruption. If you have important data in a PST, save the e-mails out as documents or import them into a real database solution (MySQL, MsSQL, Oracle, etc)
Sept. 25, 2010 10:19 a.m. wcelliot HalfDork

Okay... up and running on Outlook 207 on the new computer. Was able to get the .pst files off the old computer and add them here, so my wife as all of her email archives available.

What did not come over were the Outlook contacts/ address book (which I thought was imbedded in the .pst). I have access to all the files on the old computer, but can't fire up Outlook to "export" the data... shouldn't there be a way to extract it from the files i've already loaded?

Thanks!
Sept. 26, 2010 12:36 a.m. heyduard New Reader

@turboswede Thanks for the FYI. Haven't touched outlook since 2004.

As for the contacts, look for the .pab files in her user directory on the old hard drive. they're buried somewhere. Hopefully, I am not out of date on that as well.
Jan. 13, 2012 3:36 p.m. Jay SuperDork

^^ Canoe. Don't click the link.
Jan. 13, 2012 3:55 p.m. Tom Heath Web Manager

^^ Canoe is dead. ^^