Missing folders and contacts after migration
Hello all,
I just had to move Thunderbird from one Windows 10 desktop to another. And, I followed the process found here:
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/moving-thunderbird-data-to-a-new-computer
Unfortunately, none of the previous incoming messages (dated before 7 March), zero outgoing messages, no folders, and no contact files appear on the new computer.
Are there any recommendations about how to proceed now? If necessary, I can go back to the old desktop and try again. BTW, I moved the files by copying them to a backup drive and then from that to the new desktop.
TIA
All Replies (9)
Just a quick update. Repeated the same process and got exactly the same results. I was very careful to watch the file sizes, file counts and folder counts from the old desktop to the back up drive to the new desktop. All look good.
Not sure what to do now. :-(
What was the size of the Thunderbird folder on the source computer, and what was the size on the transfer medium, e.g. backup drive? Did you check that they were the same? Was the TB version exactly the same on both computers?
The Thunderbird folder was 4.69 GB but it also showed 5,046,372,349 which was strange. It consisted of 452 files and 45 folders.
On both computers, the TB version is 68.6.0 (32 bit).
I am concerned that the 5+ GB count vs the 4.69 GB number means there were files that did not make it onto the backup drive. But maybe this is normal.
Also, I did confirm the file size info on the source computer, the backup drive, and the new computer. All the same.
One more piece of info. Last night, I went back to the old computer to see if the messages with dates prior to 7 March were still there, and they are. Also, they are not showing any visible indications of any problems with them. It's a mystery to me why the move process did not pick them up or any of the other missing items - folders, etc.
The reason I asked about the sizes is sometimes users copy a profile folder onto a FAT32 USB drive that omits files larger than 4GB (TB stores mail folders in a single mbox file). To avoid missing any files, I usually add the Thunderbird folder to a zip or rar archive on the source computer, then extract the archive to ..AppData/Roaming on the target computer, all while TB is closed on both computers.
OK. I will give that a try and see how it goes.
The bytes to GB count seems to be correct. A converter says the byte count = 4.6998004885 GB.
Thanks!
sfhowes said
The reason I asked about the sizes is sometimes users copy a profile folder onto a FAT32 USB drive that omits files larger than 4GB (TB stores mail folders in a single mbox file). To avoid missing any files, I usually add the Thunderbird folder to a zip or rar archive on the source computer, then extract the archive to ..AppData/Roaming on the target computer, all while TB is closed on both computers.
Hi,
I created a zip file and extracted it as directed. Exact same result as before.
If there is any corruption on the source computer, should I try to re-install TB on it before trying this again? And, if there are any corrupted files, will a re-install overwrite them while preserving the data?
Uninstalling and re-installing the program doesn't usually help, as most problems are in the separate, profile folder. What I suggest is you copy the mbox files from the source computer and paste them into the Mail/Local Folders location of the target computer, while TB is closed. The mbox files are named after the message folder, have no extension, and are the largest files in the profile. Look in Mail/<popservername>, ImapMail/<imapservername> and Mail/Local Folders for the mbox files; ignore the .msf index files. When you restart TB, the folders should appear under Local Folders in the Folder Pane.