What is difference between address book and contacts in outlook

I have all my contacts including postal address and email addresses stored in outlook 2010 as contacts it syncs to my iPhone and generally it works very well.

But when I want to send an email to one of these contacts I start the new email and go to the outlook address book but then if this is a recent contact that I have not emailed before.

I have to add the email address into the outlook address book as a new contact.

Then outlook asks me if I want to update the person in the contact list, clicking yes adds the email address to the contact list.

But why do I have to add the email address into the address book why does it not retrieve the email address from the contact list

So is it possible to add all my contact emails addresses into the address book without having to do them one by one.

Address Book was actually Windows Address Book that came with WinXP and was used by Outlook Express. Contacts in Outlook could be used to import from WAB. The Contacts in Win7 is located in C:\Users\YourLogin\Contacts appears to be separate from Outlook's Contacts which are stored along with messages, settings, etc., in Outlook's .pst file.

Berton said:

Address Book was actually Windows Address Book that came with WinXP and was used by Outlook Express. Contacts in Outlook could be used to import from WAB. The Contacts in Win7 is located in C:\Users\YourLogin\Contacts appears to be separate from Outlook's Contacts which are stored along with messages, settings, etc., in Outlook's .pst file.

Thank you for the reply Berton

After reading your post I remember now the windows address book was from windows xp as I have moved on from XP it must have been transferred into the Windows 7 I use today.

In the location you say there is indeed a PTS. file but it is a small file 256KB I don't have any emails saved it there all my emails stay on the Hotmail server they are not downloaded to my computer, this way I can see my emails on any computer.

So If I understand you correctly my address book is stored in the PST. file and my contacts are stored in my Hotmail email account this must be right because if I log into Hotmail I can see my contacts.

But what I don't understand is if I go to the windows address book and add a new contact and the name is the same as one in my Hotmail contacts it says do you want to add this new details to the excising contact.

If I click yes the entry is then stored in windows address book and it also update the Hotmail contact. I don't need the two but I am not able to select an email address from the Hotmail contact

I don't understand why these two different address list are linked, if I start a new email then click on the (To) tab it open the windows address book and if I change the list to the Hotmail one there are no email addresses visible

Please how do I solve this

ThrashZone said:

Hi,
Yea the contacts manager is a pain,
The address book has no import options inside of it so it is quite confusing of which I have never understood Why there is No Import option in the address book :)
And for the record Importing into username/ Contacts does not update the address book either
Senseless.

Hi thanks for the update ThrashZone

I am not sure how to proceed now with this

I can write a new email and click on the (TO) tab to select the email name but there are only a few names in there certainly not all my contacts are there

Then if i select the contact folder in Hotmail all my contacts are there but they do not display any email addresses.

I am not sure just where windows is storing the Windows address book but if i start and add a new contact into the windows address book complete with the email address then click on save, if the name exists in the outlook data base it then says this contact already exists and do i want to update it, if i then click yes and then go back to the contact list in outlook the contact is still the same but it has the new email address that has been added.

It would be a lot easier if i could select the email address i need to use from the outlook contacts and not use the windows address book at all.

Regards to you all