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corrupted MSF files when importing from .mbx (Eudora mailboxes)

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Yes, I was still using Eudora, don't laugh. I was forced into switching email client as our email provider is now using the GMAIL server and it simply became incompatible. While Thunderbird could read the .mbx mailboxes from Eudora once copied to the Local Folder directory, many of my messages content were blank or html coded. However, the .MSF files showed headers and timestamp properly. I bought Turgs Eudora Wizard to convert the .mbx files to .mbox. This recovered my content, but now many of the headers and time stamps are corrupted. Notably, it gives me a recent time stamp rather than the original one. I could take this up with Turgs as I paid $99 for their crummy software, but I am hoping that another alternative could be to manually edit the MSF file. Is this possible? And if so, would the fix stay or it would always reset itself by default? Alternatively, does anyone have a suggestion to read the mbx files properly, perhaps with some freeware that would properly convert those files without corrupting the MSF. I used Eudora for over 20 years and I have just over 100 mailboxes and obviously thousands and thousands of emails I need to retain for work and reference purposes. Any suggestions for me?

Yes, I was still using Eudora, don't laugh. I was forced into switching email client as our email provider is now using the GMAIL server and it simply became incompatible. While Thunderbird could read the .mbx mailboxes from Eudora once copied to the Local Folder directory, many of my messages content were blank or html coded. However, the .MSF files showed headers and timestamp properly. I bought Turgs Eudora Wizard to convert the .mbx files to .mbox. This recovered my content, but now many of the headers and time stamps are corrupted. Notably, it gives me a recent time stamp rather than the original one. I could take this up with Turgs as I paid $99 for their crummy software, but I am hoping that another alternative could be to manually edit the MSF file. Is this possible? And if so, would the fix stay or it would always reset itself by default? Alternatively, does anyone have a suggestion to read the mbx files properly, perhaps with some freeware that would properly convert those files without corrupting the MSF. I used Eudora for over 20 years and I have just over 100 mailboxes and obviously thousands and thousands of emails I need to retain for work and reference purposes. Any suggestions for me?

Asịsa ahọpụtara

I suggest you start again. From scratch and use the importer in an old version of Thunderbird. That is if we are talking real Eudora and not the EUDORA OSE with is only Thunderbird. Certainly do not let any of the corruption that is Eudora be copied into your Thunderbird profile without some form of filtering as Eudora was actually very messy under the hood and the message store is a disaster waiting to happen. Why it did not is a tribute to Eudora's error handling I think because it was pretty good at essentially corrupting it's own message stores in small ways.

You can download a copy of Thunderbird V3.1 here which has a Eudora import that actually works. As if was the version +1 that Eudora OSE was based on the importer was the one OSE adopters had to use.

I offer this with the caveat that V3.1 is probably also broken with Google and you will need to update it after you import. I also suggest you familiarize yourself with the information here. http://kb.mozillazine.org/Thunderbird_:_Issues_:_Import_From_Eudora as the article offers some workarounds for common issues with Eudora files and how to fix them. If the utilities can still be downloaded.

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Asịsa Ahọpụtara

I suggest you start again. From scratch and use the importer in an old version of Thunderbird. That is if we are talking real Eudora and not the EUDORA OSE with is only Thunderbird. Certainly do not let any of the corruption that is Eudora be copied into your Thunderbird profile without some form of filtering as Eudora was actually very messy under the hood and the message store is a disaster waiting to happen. Why it did not is a tribute to Eudora's error handling I think because it was pretty good at essentially corrupting it's own message stores in small ways.

You can download a copy of Thunderbird V3.1 here which has a Eudora import that actually works. As if was the version +1 that Eudora OSE was based on the importer was the one OSE adopters had to use.

I offer this with the caveat that V3.1 is probably also broken with Google and you will need to update it after you import. I also suggest you familiarize yourself with the information here. http://kb.mozillazine.org/Thunderbird_:_Issues_:_Import_From_Eudora as the article offers some workarounds for common issues with Eudora files and how to fix them. If the utilities can still be downloaded.

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Thank you so much Matt for your prompt reply. Your suggestion and the link to an old version of Thunderbird did the trick. It solved my problem in an efficient manner.