This site will have limited functionality while we undergo maintenance to improve your experience. If an article doesn't solve your issue and you want to ask a question, we have our support community waiting to help you at @FirefoxSupport on Twitter and/r/firefox on Reddit.

Search Support

Avoid support scams. We will never ask you to call or text a phone number or share personal information. Please report suspicious activity using the “Report Abuse” option.

Learn More

Migrate old thunderbird emails & address book from defunct hard drive into Windows Live Mail on new installation

  • 1 reply
  • 1 has this problem
  • 5 views
  • Last reply by christ1

more options

Please could someone help. I was running Thunderbird on my old hard drive, but the drive broke but luckily I have managed to retrieve most of the the data from it, including the Thunderbird folder. I now need to import all the emails from the old Thunderbird folders into the Windows Live Mail program that I now have running on my new Windows 10 installation on a new hard drive. I would also like to retrieve all my address book if possible. The Windows Live Mail only gives me options to import from Outlook Express, Mail or Live Mail installations and no options for Thunderbird.

I thought that if I installed Thunderbird onto the new drive I could then export all the emails to Windows Live Mail, but I am unable to get the new installation of Thunderbird to retrieve all the old emails from the old backup folder, so I am now completely stuck. I desperately need all my old emails, so any help will be massively appreciated.

Please could someone help. I was running Thunderbird on my old hard drive, but the drive broke but luckily I have managed to retrieve most of the the data from it, including the Thunderbird folder. I now need to import all the emails from the old Thunderbird folders into the Windows Live Mail program that I now have running on my new Windows 10 installation on a new hard drive. I would also like to retrieve all my address book if possible. The Windows Live Mail only gives me options to import from Outlook Express, Mail or Live Mail installations and no options for Thunderbird. I thought that if I installed Thunderbird onto the new drive I could then export all the emails to Windows Live Mail, but I am unable to get the new installation of Thunderbird to retrieve all the old emails from the old backup folder, so I am now completely stuck. I desperately need all my old emails, so any help will be massively appreciated.

All Replies (1)

more options
I have managed to retrieve most of the the data from it, including the Thunderbird folder.

What does this mean? What you need is the profile folder. http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_folder_-_Thunderbird