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Migrating from old Mac to new PC

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I just migrated my old Thunderbird 3.1 on an old Mac to Windows 10. Everything is good, but I can't find how to see my old Local Folders. I have years of business projects sorted on these folders. I've copied them to my new Profile (Mail>Local Folders) but I still don't see them. How do I get them to appear on my new Windows version?

I just migrated my old Thunderbird 3.1 on an old Mac to Windows 10. Everything is good, but I can't find how to see my old Local Folders. I have years of business projects sorted on these folders. I've copied them to my new Profile (Mail>Local Folders) but I still don't see them. How do I get them to appear on my new Windows version?

All Replies (10)

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What did you copy from the Mac to the PC? The mbox files in the Mail/Local Folders location of the Mac profile, or did you save the messages in Mac Local Folders to eml files?

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I saved the actual folders from the Mac Profile. Mail>Local Folders. No conversions. Then I copied these into the Windows Profile in the corresponding location. Restarted TBird, but nothing shows up.

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Close TB, open Mail/Local Folders in the profile folder, delete all .msf files, then restart TB and see if the folders appear under Local Folders in the Folder Pane.

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Did as you said....went into all the subfolders and deleted the .msf. Reopened TB, but nothing shows up.

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Do you still have TB on the Mac? Open TB, select all messages in a Local Folder (Ctrl+A), then Ctrl+S to save them as eml files. Copy the eml files to the PC, create a new folder under Local Folders in TB, then drag the eml files from File Explorer and drop them onto the new folder in TB. Do the messages appear?

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I'll try this. It could take some time.....27 GB of emails organized into folders. :)

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If your folders were 27GB, it might have taken some time for TB to rebuild the msf files on restart (Tools/Activity Monitor to see the progress), before the folders appeared. Try saving as eml for one small folder to see if it works.

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I was thinking the same....do a trial run!

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Yes, one small folder does show up on the sidebar. But when I ask it to open in a new tab, the wheel keeps spinning, and nothing appears. I'll leave it overnight to see what happens, but at this point it hardly seems worth it.

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OK, I just stumbled on the solution. In the TB left-hand sidebar, recreate each top-level local folder with exactly the same name that it had on the Mac version. As soon as the folder appears, all sub-folders and emails will magically appear. Woo-hoo!!