Windows Mail

How to Reinstate Windows Mail in Windows 7​

   Warning

Microsoft no longer supports Windows Mail, aka WinMail. It's recommended you use another well known supported email client. This Tutorial is for Advanced users who importantly have the Technical Ability to make the changes, have backups of everything including your OS, and to be your own tech support for WinMail going forward. If you decide to complete this tutorial you accept the fact that you are using WinMail as-is. It might be necessary to uninstall other email clients to resolve any WinMail conflicts in some environments. Understand it's likely that new OS updates from Microsoft will break WinMail's operation, and to fix make it necessary to rerun the tutorial again to reinstate it. With those things in mind, this tutorial was written so that you can rerun it without affecting WinMail user data.
Please see this Errata (Bug List) post before you install, to be aware of the current information about known issues using WinMail within Windows 7, these issues are programmatic and in most cases cannot be resolved by this tutorial, and will never be fixed.

Having said all of that disclaimer, if you have the technical ability, and can put up with the annoying minor byproduct bugs, then like so many of us still enjoy using WinMail on Windows 7 ...ymmv!

   Tip

As of January, 2025, the instructions given here supersede all other instructions given in forthcoming older posts. Realize some of the posts that follow are over 16 years old, and many of the link pointers within have become mislinked over time, many of the files or information within them is outdated, incomplete, or superseded with more accurate information - and so be careful. However you can always be sure that the latest info from all research is incorporated into this tutorial post, and its downloads are the latest available. This post is continuously kept up-to-date, and so..
...Always refer to this Tutorial post for the very latest updated information

This is the 4th iteration of the Windows 7, WinMail tutorial.

The process of this tutorial Will Not work to reinstate WinMail on Windows 8/10 !
Windows 8/10 users please go Here

Start here

1. Download tutorial package TutReWinMail.zip
   
   Download
   
   
2. Extract the TutReWinMail.zip into your user Downloads folder
   • Note: Be sure once extracted this is the address of the ''TutReWinMail'' folder:
   • C:\Users\username\Downloads\TutReWinMail... ... (if it's not there please put it there)
3. Navigate to your user Downloads\TutReWinMail folder to be sure the above is correct.
   • (..if you need more verbose install instructions to follow, download this WinMail Local Tutorial.zip)
   • Advanced Users can proceed below:

     ---

     (..log in for Full Access, being able to get support, remove ads, like, and even to post, etc..)

Advanced Users: ..use this easy excellent overview of the steps in the local tutorial:

• Open an Administrator Command Prompt. (screenshot showing in Administrator mode)
• copy/paste this line into the command prompt: cd %USERPROFILE%\Downloads\TutReWinMail\
• Your command prompt must now be showing you are at That Same Folder Address ..which contains the tutorial files that the batch file in the next step executes programs and copies files specifically from that folder address - if it's not there the batch file will fail since it cannot find what it needs!
• Next type in either winmail32 or win64mail <matching OS bit, to interactively process These Next Steps
• If you've finished to the bottom as shown in last screenshot, restart your machine (sets registry)
• Create a shortcut from WinMail.exe to your Desktop
• Open WinMail - it may prompt you one (or both) of These Two Notices ..click yes, and okay.
• They now should be already set, but you can manually check/set at any time These Default Settings
• That's pretty much all there is to it, and from here you setup the rest of the Windows Mail client (aka: WinMail) as normal within its various tab menus for Accounts, Options, Layout, etc, etc, to suit your individual needs.
• Lastly, but should be the First thing you do, is to Create A WinMail Backup (new version) ..Go to this next link and when you get there scroll down to the heading: Backup/Restore Procedures for further instructions.

   Information

See How to open an elevated Administrator Command Prompt
Important: The exact text provided by the tutorial must be entered into the Administrator Command Prompt.
Hint: to avoid typos, copy/paste the entire line containing the command into the Command Prompt window.
Also see: How to Enable Copy to Clipboard from the Windows 7 Command Prompt

---

Every effort has been made to make this a step-by-step process, however, it is beyond the scope of a single tutorial to provide information on every command or concept. Search the Main Tutorial Section if you need greater detail on a concept or command presented in this tutorial.

Good luck, and long live WinMail

   Note

Made possible by members:
Mark (aka Mr GRiM) - provided the original tutorial
Poppa Bear - continued Mark's work within the 2nd version
endeavor - provided continuous feedback, changes, invaluable testing instrumental to tutorial operations
EKManitis - propose the batch code that made operations easier
Slartybart - updated, tested, and consolidated all of the above into the 3rd version
endeavor - reviewed, updated, tested, and incorporated all of the above into this 4th version
...and also a special thanks to All the other members who presented discovery for this project

Related Tutorials

---

• How to Backup/Restore Messages in Windows Mail (Vista version)
  
• Windows Calendar - Import into Windows 7
• Vista Windows Sidebar - Reinstate on Windows 7
• Windows Live Mail - Import Windows Mail Messages
• Windows Live Mail - Import Windows 7 and Vista Contacts

 

[endeavor]

Please email me a sample....I'll PM you.

They are not my emails to send, they have other members personal email address on them, they were addressed to them, and I promised them I would protect their private emails. Unless they give me permission I must honor that promise right. I'll ask, but in the meantime, what is not personal is where they originate from, and the return address from the 3 website flyer senders that I have are:
I'll wrap them in tags since they are live

1.

BFAds Webmaster [EMAIL="[email protected]"][email protected][/EMAIL]

2.

My Best Buy [EMAIL="[email protected]"][email protected][/EMAIL]

3.

KapscoMoto [EMAIL="[email protected]"][email protected][/EMAIL]

..and there is some current posters yet to submit their .eml file that have not yet - ask them too. Having them figure out how to get the proper ones though is another story, and I covered that on a previous post of post 17, and then scroll to post 23.

 

[kewl1]

It's a Miracle. Thanks

Hello Guys,

First to answer the question regarding my version of Windows 7. I'm sorry this may not be of much help. A friend passed away last year and his wife let me have a bunch of computer stuff from his office She is totally computer illiterate and was going to toss everything in the garbage. As I said I had Windows 7 on my desktop since it first came out. For some strange reason I could never get the SP1 to install but I have always downloaded the updates. But he left a disk (download maybe?) that simply had hand written on it Windows 7 SP1. So this I put on my new X1 Carbon. I downloaded all the updates and had all these problems with Mail. During these few days I also updated my x300 ThinkPad and then it had the same problems……UNTILL I removed the 3 updates. I now realize that I also did a system restore.



After reading the posts here from Endeavor and others I turned off IE11 and the problem immediately went away. I then uninstalled the IE 11 update, turned IE 10m on and the problem seems to have disappeared. I went back to my x300 where I noticed that it had i.e. 10. It also no longer had two i.e. icons one of which had said IE64 bit. This must have been removed with the System Restore. I use Firefox anyway.


Anyway for me this is such a big deal because I was reluctant to even use my new X1Carbon because to me it was like it was “defective” since I couldn’t use my email so as crazy as it might sound to a normal person I have been using both the old and new laptops and refraining from even adding software to the new one because of this. Some of my programs really require the i7 processor in my x1 which is why I bought it so this was really disappointing.


I cannot thank you enough for giving me the solution to this nightmare. It would seem that indeed the problem was cased by IE11

 

[endeavor]

Hello Guys,

I cannot thank you enough for giving me the solution to this nightmare. It would seem that indeed the problem was cased by IE11

You're welcome and thanks for your post.

IE10 is pretty good too.. IE11 just takes it up a notch, but IE10 is fine.
You can still use Firefox as your browser that's fine, but WinMail still draws on IE and that's why.

 

[Ex_Brit]

Please email me a sample....I'll PM you.

They are not my emails to send, they have other members personal email address on them, they were addressed to them, and I promised them I would protect their private emails. Unless they give me permission I must honor that promise right. I'll ask, but in the meantime, what is not personal is where they originate from, and the return address from the 3 website flyer senders that I have are:
I'll wrap them in tags since they are live

1.

BFAds Webmaster [EMAIL="[email protected]"][email protected][/EMAIL]

2.

My Best Buy [EMAIL="[email protected]"][email protected][/EMAIL]

3.

KapscoMoto [EMAIL="[email protected]"][email protected][/EMAIL]

..and there is some current posters yet to submit their .eml file that have not yet - ask them too. Having them figure out how to get the proper ones though is another story, and I covered that on a previous post of post 17, and then scroll to post 23.

Strange but that doesn't ring any bells here.,

 

[kewl1]

"WinMail still draws on IE and that's why."

When I unchecked the box to disable IE11 I did get a warning that it could affect other Windows functions or something like that and I believe in a previous post there was reference to it being so embedded or entwined with Windows that it's even difficult to separate. I previously had no idea that it was in any way connected to Mail and have no idea what else might be affected but I will leave it turned on now except in its IE10 version.

Again thanks so much. I have always found this to be such an excellent forum

 

[endeavor]

kewl1, you typed in that last line referring to IE11:
"but I will leave it turned on now except in its IE10 version"

You meant to say turned Off right?

Well either way, something is amiss in understanding and I just needed to dot the i's on this.

Please read again in the first paragraph of what I found in my test on post 1435

And so after you read that you will see if IE11 is not uninstalled but only disabled, but even though IE11 is disabled (which just means you can't access the internet with a browser is all and self-explanatory) but with WM and IE11 installed even if IE11 disabled via unchecking it in the "Turn Windows Features On or Off" options, On 64 bit Not 32 bit, WinMail Will Still Crash with IE11 disabled on the problematic HTML emails because it is 'still installed but only internet disabled' therefore still directly connected to IE11's HTML rendering process and that's the problem, however in either way it will not crash on IE8, IE9, or IE10 is what the answer is.

I think having read your posts again you have said that you used System Restore to a previous restore point, but that actually uninstalled IE11 to the Previous IE version, and not just disabled it as indicated, and why you started working. This is all an important distinction though and is why I needed to clarify it.

 

[kewl1]

Sorry for the confusion Endeavor. It's probably due to my trying to talk about two laptops.

OK the new laptop; I installed Windows 7.1 and all updates. Windows Mail had bad problems. After reading your post about a likely relationship between WinMail and IE11, I disabled IE11 and the problems disappeared. So I also then uninstalled the IE11 Update and re-enabled IE which now appears as IE 10 and Mail is perfect.

On the old laptop I never had a problem until the same time I had the problem with the new one. This would seem to point to an update. I also had two icons for IE one of which was labeled 64 bit and I used it only occasionally because I use Firefox. Then I downloaded about 10 updates and got the same problems with Mail that I had on the new computer. I removed the updates about 3 at a time and the problems went away. In retrospect I also did a system restore which I now think must have removed the IE11 update if it was not one of the ones I removed manually. Both laptops IE's say they are now version 10. The 64 bit icon that was there for quite some time is also now gone. I cannot explain that since I'm positive it was there long before there was an IE11. Maybe even prior to IE10. I used to wonder why I had two IE icons, one of which said 64 and the other nothing.
I hope this helps

 

[endeavor]

The important thing here is to know in your situation kewl1 is that when you moved back to IE10, WM works fine concerning the problem.
I just needed to make sure you didn't have any helpful hidden gems to learn from. Thank you.

Working towards a simple, logical, proper, and quick way to get it for '64bit' IE11 users too, if possible.
Will be working on it in the Spare time but certainly don't hold any breaths waiting; for the majority of 64bit WinMail users, IE10 is the easiest answer for now.

 

[Paul Markham]

Paul Markham

Hi.

I have been trying to use this to install Windows Mail in Windows 8.1.

I get to the 'Authorised Command Prompt' box where is shows C:\Windows\system 32.

It won't allow me to delete that and insert C:\Users\Paul\Downloads\TutReWinMail\

I have tried typing C:\Users etc. after C:\Windows'system 32 but that doesn't work.

Could it be that this not working because this method doesn't work for Windows 8.1?

I am not that computer savvy but can anyone help?

Many thanks.

Paul

 

[endeavor]

Welcome to the SevenForums Paul,

This thread is only for Windows 7 WinMail users support, but thank you for your post and inquiry.

To get some information on how to do it for Windows 8 it may be best to request that on the EightForums and someone can help you there.
The method there is not as written organized as it is for Windows 7, but it's all there is right now. Also it's more for advanced users and of course not supported. You can start by reading the thread over there, and here is the link below to do that, Thank you.

How to use Winmail on Windows 8.

 

[endeavor]

Well I have some very good news about the WinMail HTML crash problem for 64 bit users. MS has recently released an IE Cumulative update that in the process of fixing a few dozens other important issues, has also affected the outcome and has fixed this crash issue for 64bit WinMail users too.
In the end I couldn't have hoped for a more easier and better outcome.

I've tested this tonight and now all Six problematic crash .eml files that have been sent in from other users, all of them now open in Win7 64 bit without crashing anymore.

You can download the update from Windows Update, if it's not already installed by now.

You can read about the update details here:
MS14-010: Cumulative security update for Internet Explorer 11 in Windows 7 x64 Edition

You can download it from Windows Update, or here:
Download Cumulative Security Update for IE 11 in Windows 7 x64 Edition (KB2909921)

 

[Slartybart]

Nice work endeavor, way to follow through.

 

[Slavic]

I checked the mails from Booking.com, no crashes any more! This means that Microsoft finally fixed that nasty bug in mshml.dll with last update. I use IE11 on my system as a secondary browser after primary Chrome. Thank you, endeavor!

 

[endeavor]

Thank you Bill (Slartybart), and Slavic for your post, also a thank you to Each of those members and non-members who've sent in their problematic .eml files; even Slavic your crashtest.eml file was very insightful, nice job. A thank you to Peter (Ex_Brit) he sent me updates screenshots and other version informations I asked for when on the hunt to track it down why it worked for him and not us, all of which led to installing that last recent update that I can see changes/shows all of the necessary files being reworked/updated - everything from the the iexplorer.exe in the starndard 64 and well as the (x86) programs folder, same thing for a few mshtml related files in both standard Systems (64) folder and well as the Syswow64 folder (which un-intuitively named, but is the 32 bit folder) ...where it changed mshtml related files in there too, and on and on and on with another hundred files, and registry changes, for the good.
Thanks to everyone! ...including of course Microsoft ! ...even though it wasn't directly fixed for WinMail, it fixed lots of problems that were the very cause of the problem, and many other problems non-related as well.

 

[Ex_Brit]

Glad to hear the news, but wonder why I wasn't effected by it. Maybe I already have that update.
I haven't yet had time to check.

 

[RKelly5327]

Endeavor, you are amazing, a great guy and very helpful. I finally opened the email I sent to you and WM opened it just fine without crashing. That's the first time. I'll keep an eye out for any more and see how it goes. I was surprised to see it work like it should- a nice surprise, though. Thanks so much for the great effort you make to help all of us out here in the wilds.

 

[endeavor]

Glad to hear the news, but wonder why I wasn't effected by it.

Because you had your Automatic Updates set on Automatic, and just the day before you tried the problematic .eml file, your system had already auto-updated automatically installed the KB update that fixed the problem. If you had opened that .eml file just the day before, You, Would of Crashed, guaranteed.. ..and so fate and timing saved you the hassle. You had never seen one of those particular .eml files before that moment and so you did not experience it as is was.
If you want to prove to yourself that you will crash, just un-install that KB and try to open your problematic .eml file.

As I said though thanks for being a helpful sport and sending me everything I asked for in identification.

 

[Ex_Brit]

When I get a chance to tear myself away from spammers invading another board I work on I'll certainly give it a try. Thanks Endeavor.

 

[Ex_Brit]

Glad to hear the news, but wonder why I wasn't effected by it.

Because you had your Automatic Updates set on Automatic, and just the day before you tried the problematic .eml file, your system had already auto-updated automatically installed the KB update that fixed the problem. If you had opened that .eml file just the day before, You, Would of Crashed, guaranteed.. ..and so fate and timing saved you the hassle. You had never seen one of those particular .eml files before that moment and so you did not experience it as is was.
If you want to prove to yourself that you will crash, just un-install that KB and try to open your problematic .eml file.

As I said though thanks for being a helpful sport and sending me everything I asked for in identification.

You are right...tried removing that update and whammo.... WM crashed. BTW I have WU set to alert me, but never install anything automatically.

Which bears out what I've been preaching for what seems to be 1000 years in various forums, keep your computer up to date, all of it, even bits you may not use, especially browsers and their add-ons.

 

[Slartybart]

the Syswow64 folder (which un-intuitively named .....

SysWOW64 -> System Windows on Windows 64
Because many things are just stubs to system32

It took me a while to figure out the acronyms the MS geeks chose (winsxs -> side-by-side) but it does eventually make sense

CBS always made me think of Columbia Broadcasting system, until I learned it was Component Based Servicing.

There all intuitively named if you know what they mean

I'm just glad that I don't have to muck with the tutorial or add any other back level component.

It would have eventually worked itself out when the members updated Windows, but your efforts cleared up what could have been a real head scratching mystery.

Thanks again endeavor.

Bill
.