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Lost all inbox mails moving from Pop to IMAP account using "move to" function.

  • 3 cavab
  • 2 have this problem
  • 2 views
  • Last reply by DarrenAC

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I have just created an IMAP account to replace my POP account. After successfully doing this I selected all of the mails in my inbox and used the "move to" function to move them all to my IMAP account. The messages started copying, however a while later whern I checked they had all disappeared from both accounts. I have looked in the profile folders under mail and imapmail (as well as others) and cannot find them. Have I lost them all? Any help retrieving them will be appreciated.

I have just created an IMAP account to replace my POP account. After successfully doing this I selected all of the mails in my inbox and used the "move to" function to move them all to my IMAP account. The messages started copying, however a while later whern I checked they had all disappeared from both accounts. I have looked in the profile folders under mail and imapmail (as well as others) and cannot find them. Have I lost them all? Any help retrieving them will be appreciated.

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I found a solution to this problem. I found the folder where the emails were located C:\users\user\appdata\roaming\thunderbird\profiles\profile\mail and found the folder that was being used for that particular address. Then right click and chose "restore previous versions." A list appears and I chose the last date before my problem occurred. All emails up to this date were retrieved.

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If you are trying to move pop mail account emails back onto the same server they originated from, so you can read them via IMAP.

Suggest you make sure your IMAP mail account subscribed folders are synchronised, so a copy is downloaded and stored in the Thunderbird profile.

Then go into 'offline' mode to stop further synchronising. The in pop account - right click on email and use the method 'Copy to' folder on imap mail account.

Go into 'online' mode which will synchronise the folder and check the 'copied to' email is able to be read.

If all is ok, then go into 'offline' mode and copy emails as before. Suggest you do it batches.

When all is correctly on the server you can delete the emails in the pop mail account, compact the pop folders to remove all traces of 'marked as deleted' emails and remove the account via 'Account settings'

The alternative is to move pop emails into suitable folders in 'Local Folders' mail account. They will not be on the server; they are still stored on your computer and still visible, but it does mean you can then remove the pop mail account.

Please remember, regardless of where your emails are stored, on server or on computer, they should still be backed up.

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Thank you very much Toad-Hall.