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Moving profile from a very old version of Thunderbird to another computer with a current version of Thunderbird

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  • Last reply by christ1

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I have an old Toshiba Satellite A205 laptop, running Vista and Thunderbird 3.1.14. I want to move all the emails to another computer, currently without Thunderbird installed. I have copied the Users/owner/appdata/roaming/Thunderbird/profiles directory to a thumbdrive.

Question: Can I install the current version of Thunderbird on the second laptop and then copy the profiles directory from the thumbdrive to the same named directory on the new laptop/current version of Thunderbird? Will it work?

I run Firefox as my default browser on all my computers.

I have an old Toshiba Satellite A205 laptop, running Vista and Thunderbird 3.1.14. I want to move all the emails to another computer, currently without Thunderbird installed. I have copied the Users/owner/appdata/roaming/Thunderbird/profiles directory to a thumbdrive. Question: Can I install the current version of Thunderbird on the second laptop and then copy the profiles directory from the thumbdrive to the same named directory on the new laptop/current version of Thunderbird? Will it work? I run Firefox as my default browser on all my computers.

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When your problem is fixed, can you mark the thread as 'Solved' please? Thank you.

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basically if you Thunderbird folder from the old device is located in the appdata\roaming folder on the new device when Thunderbird is installed it should "just use it" as the profiles.ini file in the Thunderbird folder will be present.

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I installed the current version of Thunderbird on my Windows 7 laptop. After copying the Profile directory from my thumbdrive, I restarted the laptop and tried to open Thunderbird. An error message appeared stating that the profile couldn't be read. Any suggestions?

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Did you also copy profiles.ini?

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Went back and reread the instructions on how to move your profile, on the Mozilla Support page. Incorrectly assumed that everything I needed to move/copy was located in the Profiles directory. After receiving this hint, I went back and found the piece, on another page that referenced the actual profiles.ini file. Would have been a lot easier if the instructions on moving the Profile directory contained the instruction to move the profiles.ini file at the same time.

Moved the profiles.ini file from the old laptop to the new install and all is well!

Thank you for the hint......

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Chosen Solution

When your problem is fixed, can you mark the thread as 'Solved' please? Thank you.