You're saying that you can't even find the thunderbird client? I will assume you use Windows and my suggestions follow that assumption.

1. enter %appdata% in search box in task bar and press enter
2. that should open file explorer at appdata\roaming
3. locate the thunderbird folder and COPY it to somewhere else (this shouldn't be needed, but just being safe)
4. download thunderbird from thunderbird.net, preferably the same release you were using (either the ESR or Monthly release) and install
5. start thunderbird and it should open to the proper profile

This assumes that the profile itself was not corrupted. If the above doesn't work, please provide some specifics. thank you.

Hello,

Thank you for your reply. Using your suggestion of %appdata% I found the Thunderbird file and copied it. It had 3 files in it and 2 other things. The files were Crash Reports 624kB, Pending Pings (empty) and Profile which was 1.60GB.

When I searched 'C' drive I could not find these. Only some install exe and files from 2023,2020.

Did what you suggested but it did the same as when I went to install Thunderbird again and wanted my e-mail and password, thought I better not incase it wiped out my previous set up.

Went through with it this time, downloaded all new e-mails but I do not have any old e-mails or sent e-mails or contacts or any of the set up I did have.

What happened was I went to upgrade to 150??? or something and it said to restart, so I closed Thunderbird and then started it up again but the short cut on the task bar when I clicked it said along the lines of this short cut no longer works.

So I thought maybe I should have restarted the computer, I did that and the same thing happened, short cut does not work or it is in a different place, something like that.

So that is when I tried to install Thunderbird 78.3.1 exe again. The original I got and it did the same thing I described above, wanted new set up (e-mail,password) done.

So anyway do not not know if any of that was relevant but any suggestions how to retrieve my old e-mails and contacts etc?

  Any suggestions much appreciated.

    Terry

Being prompted to enter email address again indicates thunderbird had problems with the old profile. To clear and restart this process, I suggest this:

1. as before, locate and copy the appdata\thunderbird folder to a safe place. do this with thunderbird not running
2. uninstall thunderbird
3. download and install the ESR version from https://www.thunderbird.net/en-US/thunderbird/all/ that is version 140.
4. start thunderbird
5. if prompted for an email address, skip it, and click help>troubleshootinginformation
6. then, scroll to 'profiles' and and click 'about:profiles'
7. the next screen will list all profiles. Your old one should be there. see if you can launch it and let me know status.

Hello,

Sorry for taking so long to get back to you, had some bad weather and life got in the way. Anyway tried what you suggested and it worked.

Just wondering though before I try it and maybe cause havock again, do I now set that profile to the " set as default profile"? The default is currently the "esr" one you suggested to download.

There is also another profile there besides the "esr" one you said to download, I am assuming that is the one I set up? Do I just leave that alone?

Also for my curiousity is the "Extended Support Release" better for fixing problems/ recovery than the standard (recommended) download and does it work over the long term as good as the recommended download?

    Thank you very much for your help.

P.S. Weather still giving me grief, satellite connection dropping out all the time. Storms and lightning about,hopefully computer will not fry before I can send this!

Try this: - click help>troubleshootinginformation: - scroll to 'profiles' and click 'about:profiles' - there should be your old profile in the list. Click the 'launch' button to see if that is the one you want

On your question, the ESR release is supposed to be more stable, as it only receives major update annually

terry691, can you remove formatting from your messages before you post them so they are easier to read? Please see your previous messages for what I am talking about.

terry691, can you remove formatting from your messages before you post them so they are easier to read? Please see your previous messages for what I am talking about.

What Rick means, is please avoid putting spaces before your sentences.

Hello All,was wondering why it was going funny when I replied. Anyway have found the correct profile and launched it as I said, what I was curious about is do I now make it the default profile or just leave it how it is with the ESR the default? Thank you

In an attempt to clarify, if you're using the profile, it is now the default, regardless if its' name. When I referenced the ESR, I was referring to the software version, 140, which is the ESR release. The monthly release (now 147) is also stable, but encounters monthly updates with new features.