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setting up thunderbird: how do I get it to download ALL existing messages, old and new?

  • 8 replies
  • 0 have this problem
  • 59 views
  • Last reply by ri3068466

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Hello wise people of the internet,

I've just installed Thunderbird, which happily downloaded the last couple years worth of messages... and then stopped. I can't get it to pick up the rest, even though there's another fifteen years of email that I'd like to preserve on this computer. I tried repairing the folder: it flickers through the existing emails for a while, and maybe stretches the stop date another month or two back, but otherwise doesn't change anything.

I'd be very grateful for any suggestions! I'm truly just using this as a backup for my emails (I continue to read and send within the browser), so it's important to me to get it all here.

Thanks in advance!

Hello wise people of the internet, I've just installed Thunderbird, which happily downloaded the last couple years worth of messages... and then stopped. I can't get it to pick up the rest, even though there's another fifteen years of email that I'd like to preserve on this computer. I tried repairing the folder: it flickers through the existing emails for a while, and maybe stretches the stop date another month or two back, but otherwise doesn't change anything. I'd be very grateful for any suggestions! I'm truly just using this as a backup for my emails (I continue to read and send within the browser), so it's important to me to get it all here. Thanks in advance!

All Replies (8)

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You might try - highlight inbox - click file>offline>downloadsync but that's a lot of messages, so I don't know if it will timeout or not.

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Thanks, David -- I tried that, but nothing changed. Is there a way to see if it's timing out, and if so to extend the process?

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Thunderbird doesn't time out, but possible that email host's server might. That's a lot of email, and I have no experience with that volume. I did see another product at

https://www.bitrecover.com/blog/imap-mail-backup-tool/  that may be more appropriate. I haven't used it, but it may work for your purposes.
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Thanks so much, David -- I will check that out!

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What mail provider? For example Google POP defaults to only allowing the mail since the POP setting was enabled, or what was downloaded up until the last pop session.

If it is google you might want to look here https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#settings/fwdandpop

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It's Yahoo, in this instance. I couldn't get Thunderbird to stop timing out, so I'm trying eM Client now... and the same problems come up.

Seems like this shouldn't be so complicated, especially if all I'm trying to do is archive my messages locally! (I'll continue to send/receive from the web.) But tech is like that....

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To download up to 100k messages per folder with AOL or Yahoo accounts, add export. to the server address:

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1409271

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Thanks, sfhowes -- that's a very useful tip!