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no more old mails in Thunderbird after migration

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  • Last reply by david

bustopher
bustopher
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hello, I've tried to migrate the original 'profile' directory (appData -> roaming -> thunderbird -> profiles) to a centralized NAS, to have access to my mails (POP3) from several computers. I copied the whole thunderbird directory to the NAS and changed the profile directory in thunderbird to the new location. But now there are no more mails visible, neither on the original PC, nor on an other laptop. Instead of that I see some dozens of (sub)directories of the profile directory, and some else in the left window... What's more, now I cannot change the directory on the original Pc back to the original location on the local harddisc (there is an error message, that the directory would not be not suitable...) What am I doing wrong? I am using windows 11 and 10, and the Thunderbird build is 115.8.1 (64 bit)

hello, I've tried to migrate the original 'profile' directory (appData -> roaming -> thunderbird -> profiles) to a centralized NAS, to have access to my mails (POP3) from several computers. I copied the whole thunderbird directory to the NAS and changed the profile directory in thunderbird to the new location. But now there are no more mails visible, neither on the original PC, nor on an other laptop. Instead of that I see some dozens of (sub)directories of the profile directory, and some else in the left window... What's more, now I cannot change the directory on the original Pc back to the original location on the local harddisc (there is an error message, that the directory would not be not suitable...) What am I doing wrong? I am using windows 11 and 10, and the Thunderbird build is 115.8.1 (64 bit)

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david
david
  • Top 10 Contributor
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Not knowing your specific requirements, I always recommend copying the ...appdata\roaming\thunderbird folder as that includes the vital pointer identifying which profile is the active one. You copied just the profiles folder which, from your post has many inactive profiles, so the challenge is in identifying which was the one being used. The other challenge is that, if the folder was copied while Thunderbird was running, the active profile may be corrupt. First, I suggest reviewing the profiles folder on the external media that was copied to verify that the missing folders are actually there. Second, if the original PC is still available, I would browse the ...appdata\roaming\thunderbird\profiles.ini file to see which was the active profile.

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