I have had problems with Thunderbird updates on my laptop

What problems?

If I install version 68.10 using the .exe file, will my current profile remain intact and undisturbed?

You could either install 68.10 over the existing version, or install it in a separate directory. In any case, when running 68.10 it would also upgrade the profile.

Updating through "About Thunderbird" only shows the option to update to 60.9.1.

Then what version are you currently running on the laptop computer?

Sticking with old versions forever will ultimately bite you at some point. I'd install the latest release version (currently 78.8.1) in a separate directory and create a new profile for it. That leaves you a safety net to use 68.10 with your existing profile if needed.

Needless to say, make sure you do have a full backup of your existing profile before messing with it. https://support.mozilla.org/kb/profiles-where-thunderbird-stores-user-data#w_backing-up-a-profile

I don't remember the specific problems, but do remember intentionally searching for and installing older versions of Thunderbird on several occasions during the many years I have been using it.

The laptop had 60.1.0 on it. I updated it to 68.12.1. in three stages using About Thunderbird.

"Sticking with old versions forever will ultimately bite you at some point." In what ways do you mean by the above statement?

"Sticking with old versions forever will ultimately bite you at some point." In what ways do you mean by the above statement?

As the users of Eudora found.. It took them almost 10 years, but gradually overtime they could simply not authenticate to an ever increasing number of mail services to get mail. creasing encryption and updates to the security used are accelerating this, not slowing it.

In the case of Thunderbird going backward usually exacerbates problems that might have occurred with an update and for some folks places them in a position where future upgrades on the profile became more prone to failures. We test going forward, not backwards.

Then there is the issues most XP users encountered before the realization arrived to update .... They also could not authenticate and get mail with Thunderbird because their operating system did not support modern encryption which the mail providers required.

But there is also the small things. All software is full of holes. Some harmless, others a vector for exploitation. Every 4 weeks Thunderbird gets a release that closes the latest batch of holes that has been identified as a security risk. There is a listing of them here https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/security/known-vulnerabilities/thunderbird/#thunderbird78.6 While not all risks affect everyone, you and I are not really in a position of being security experts (well I am not anyway) so I rely on the folks that are to look after things for me. These issues are sort of universal to software, and that is why folks are always getting "if it aint broke don't fix it" updates to complain about. Everyone is issuing patches to vulnerabilities. This week we in Australia were advised about a particularly nasty Microsoft exchange vulnerability. https://www.cyber.gov.au/acsc/view-all-content/alerts/exchange-server-critical-vulnerabilities Microsoft have released patches going back about a decade to versions as early as 2013 With products like Thunderbird that are supported usually for about 4 weeks after a new version release you will not get a security patch on your old software, only the newest version.

It is a common misconception that anti virus/ Internet security suites protect against these vulnerabilities. They do not. This is why many of them actually push software updates to installed packages as one of their functions. That is how they "protect" against them, they ask you to install the patches.

So it might never bite you, or you could be the victim of one of the system drive encryption malwares it is all a gamble we each take daily when we connect to the internet. But having out of date software significantly increases you risk of getting hit.

Then there is the support issue. Nobody here is still using V60, so when you do have a problem those trying to help are dredging in their memory and can not in some instances even remember what the screens looked like in the version to tell you what to do. Add-on authors are certainly not supporting their old versions, they are focused on the present. They will not even be looking at any bugs that do not affect their current release. So you are isolating yourself from support in a subtle but powerful way.

Personally I had the upgrade to V78 from hell. So I know where you are coming from, but I am still running V78.8.1 not some old version because I need to keep things as secure as I can.

Thank you, Matt, for the thoughtful reply.

By the way, any suggestions on curing the failing downloads in Firefox? I have searched and followed some suggestions, but nothing has cured the problem yet for me.

I updated to 78.8.1 and four out of six mailboxes don't have the right facing caret icon that lets you expand them to see all the subfolders. Also the icons changed to blue. It has a completely different interface that I find much less intuitive. How do I get the subfolders to show up again?