Outlook 2010 backup/restore emails

ahmedilyas · 02 Jul 2011

Hi.
I have an old system and a new system.
I am running outlook 2010.
Currently on my old system I have a few POP3 email accounts and also lots of emails in seperate folders (sorted by the rule filter).

I backed up the outlook to a .pst and then imported this on the new machine.
Great, I have my emails etc...!

Problem: When I create my email account again on the new machine, it seems to want to download all the emails again.
How can I prevent this from happening and just to "continue" as normal?
Maybe something I need to set up/configure on the POP3 provider?

Thanks!

Irene · 03 Jul 2011

Hello ahmedilyas.

I think is the resolution to your problem:
Don’t re-download all emails | MSOutlook.info

When starting with a new mail profile (which gets created when you configure your new computer), Outlook is unaware of what has been downloaded already by another mail profile. That is why Outlook starts to download all the messages again.
Some mail servers allow you to set a date from which emails are being offered to a POP3 client or allow you to set the option to download from the current day onwards.
For instance, Gmail can do this in the following way;

Log onto the web based version of Gmail.
Click the Settings link in the right top corner.
Select the “Forwarding and POP/IMAP” tab.
Set the option: Enable POP for mail that arrives from now on.
Press: Save Changes

If your web based mail account doesn’t provide such an option, and you still want to leave the messages on the server, then you can move all the emails that you do not want to download again to a different folder on the server. As POP3 only offers messages from the main Inbox, Outlook can’t see the other messages so it won’t download them again either.

Some web based mail accounts also offer an Archiving option which makes moving your items to another folder on the server much easier.

Hope that helps. Please let us know if you need any further assistance. :)

jimbo45 · 03 Jul 2011

Hi there
Easier method

1) download pfbackup.exe from Microsoft -- it says for Office 2003 and 2007 but also works for office 2010 (both 32 and 64 bit verstions).

2) install on both Source and target machines.

3) on office 2007 you'll now see a BACKUP option in the main file menu - on 2010 it will be in the ADDINS from the toolbar.

4) save the folders you want by running backup. Can be to a USB etc or whatever.

5) create your account etc on the new machine.

6) open backup and then move the folders to the folders on the new machine.

7) close backup folders.

Job done.

BTW I'd set up your email as IMAP rather than POP3 if poss -- it's easier if accessing your email via different machines. POP3 is a rather old protocol in any case.

Cheers
jimbo

ahmedilyas · 03 Jul 2011

Irene - thank-you so much! I may try the suggestion of creating a folder on the mailserver and moving existing items to it.

Jimbo45 - why IMAP?

jimbo45 · 09 Jul 2011

Hi there
IMAP -- simply if you've ever used several computers then IMAP accesses the mail DIRECTLY ON THE SERVER. No probs acessing email from multiple computers -- useful if you travel a lot and use different laptops.

POP transfers it usually to the computer you are using and has a problem with using shared data files on networked drives.

here's a pictorial representation (thanks to Univ of Minnesota)

IMAP vs. POP

In general POP will be gradually phased out in any case.

cheers
jimbo