Windows Mail App partially syncing

[JohnDoe1980]

Hello. I have a client who was using Windows Live Mail on their older laptop. They bought a new laptop and I migrated the user data using Fabs Backup to the new laptop. We set up their email account with Windows Mail App. I set sync settings to sync "any time", but their inbox is only showing email for a couple weeks going back. Also, they had folders which are not there and contacts. Any ideas on how to sync everything would be appreciated. Thanks.

 

[nlinecomputers]

Difficult to answer without more information. IMAP? POP3? Mail may have been downloaded to the local PC and deleted from the server. No sync is possible if that is the case.

 

[JohnDoe1980]

Difficult to answer without more information. IMAP? POP3? Mail may have been downloaded to the local PC and deleted from the server. No sync is possible if that is the case.

I'm not sure, as I don't have the computer here with me. I'm pretty sure it was set up correctly though.

 

[Markverhyden]

Do you understand the differences between IMAP and POP3? By default IMAP automatically keeps the emails on the server so it can be synced with all devices setup with that account until instructed to delete them. POP3 on the other hand will only sync to one client at a time. Being the first client to talk to the server at any point in time. It'll ignore further requests for those already downloaded emails.

Sounds like they were setup with POP3. By the way contacts are never kept as part of POP3 or IMAP. However you can usually export them from the client to a .CSV. Another tidbit. Almost all email providers that have POP3 also have IMAP. Just need to know how to set it up as IMAP.

 

[JohnDoe1980]

Do you understand the differences between IMAP and POP3? By default IMAP automatically keeps the emails on the server so it can be synced with all devices setup with that account until instructed to delete them. POP3 on the other hand will only sync to one client at a time. Being the first client to talk to the server at any point in time. It'll ignore further requests for those already downloaded emails.

Sounds like they were setup with POP3. By the way contacts are never kept as part of POP3 or IMAP. However you can usually export them from the client to a .CSV. Another tidbit. Almost all email providers that have POP3 also have IMAP. Just need to know how to set it up as IMAP.

They were set up with POP. I removed that account and added it using IMAP. That worked, but same issue, only showing emails for the past month or so. The client has it working on their old laptop on windows live mail showing older messages and folders.

 

[JohnDoe1980]

They were set up with POP. I removed that account and added it using IMAP. That worked, but same issue, only showing emails for the past month or so. The client has it working on their old laptop on windows live mail showing older messages and folders.

I'm not sure how to export emails. I googled it and found exporting contacts and calendars but not emails. I need to do all of them. Sorry, I'm a total noob in this department.

 

[Markverhyden]

I'm not sure how to export emails. I googled it and found exporting contacts and calendars but not emails. I need to do all of them. Sorry, I'm a total noob in this department.

A common technique to move emails, as long as the old computer is still working, is create a new temp account using IMAP, add that to the old client then copy from old account to new account with in the client. It's important you copy rather than move. Almost all ISP email services allow creating additional email accounts. If not just gmail. Either way make sure to delete the new account once you're sure everything is moved over.

 

[timeshifter]

The client has it working on their old laptop on windows live mail showing older messages and folders.

Is that one POP or IMAP?

 

[JohnDoe1980]

Is that one POP or IMAP?

not sure yet

 

[JohnDoe1980]

not sure yet

Just checked. It's POP.

 

[britechguy]

Just checked. It's POP.

Hence the reason that all the email "from time immemorial" is downloaded and available there, and long gone on the server. I have no idea when this account was originally set up on the machine where it was set up with POP, but heaven only knows why any tech would do that if IMAP were available at the time. Using IMAP avoids exactly this issue entirely, as the storage is on the server, not the client.

But once a message is downloaded via POP, it's purged from the server, and you can't just "will it back" to be available via IMAP. Only messages coming in, that have not already been downloaded elsewhere via POP, will be available for IMAP (ignoring Google, which is a distinctive hybrid system that allows the same message pool to be accessed via POP on one machine and IMAP on another, though who would want to do this I cannot imagine).

All devices still using that account should be checked to be absolutely certain they are using IMAP access.

 

[Computer Bloke]

it was set up with POP, but heaven only knows why any tech would do that if IMAP were available at the time.

Storage limits. (Some people literally (literally "literally") never delete a message. My father-in-law is one.)

Privacy. ("I don't want my ISP reading my email." Yes, really.)

Ignorance, laziness or incompetence. (Sadly, not all technicians are created equal.)

It happens less when people use their phones as their primary email device, but it still happens.

 

[Markverhyden]

All this stuff needs to be taken in context. Consumers generally use consumer grade support. AKA free. So they'll just be doing what ever the AOL, MSN, Comcast, Spectrum, ATT etc, etc techs tell them to do. Even if they happen to get someone domestic it's doubtful they, the tech, will do due diligence. After all they are rated on how quickly they can dispose of a support call as resolved. Remember most consumers know next to nothing so they won't miss what they don't know.

On the whole POP vs IMAP for4 ISP's and free email. Much of that started a few years after 2k. And many of them were silent about it. No notification to customers. Autodiscovery in many clients automatically configure, which people click through without reading or understanding click through, for POP the first time its run. I know I've made that mistake a few time when rushing through getting stuff setup.

 

[britechguy]

Storage limits. (Some people literally (literally "literally") never delete a message. My father-in-law is one.)

Privacy. ("I don't want my ISP reading my email." Yes, really.)

Ignorance, laziness or incompetence. (Sadly, not all technicians are created equal.)

It happens less when people use their phones as their primary email device, but it still happens.

1. Storage - Hence the reason I will not support clients, as in say, "Hell, no!," in a businesslike way, if they insist they can NEVER delete ANY message. Email is no different than real mail, and if people cannot understand that, and know that most email is "read and pitch" then I don't want to deal with their inevitable problems. In my opinion, and that's all it is, we do our clients a disservice if all we do is keep enabling the untenable. I've been using IMAP for decades, literally, and am not as good at practicing what I preach as I wish I were, but I'm still under 10 GB for email and will likely never, ever exceed that. Read and pitch; it's easy. What needs to be kept/filed is the exception, not the rule. Being an enabler is not a part of my personal job description.

2. Privacy. Any time anyone says something like what you quoted to me, I say, "Well, don't you think that horse is out of the barn. They have ALL your email messages before you ever see them, and if they wanted to read them (and they don't), you could not stop them." What they're saying is roughly equivalent to saying that you don't want the Post Office to handle your mail because they might read it. And if you believe that either your email provider or the postal service is reading your (e)mail, you're in tin foil hat territory.

3. Sadly, yes.

Part of our role is as educators. Always has been, always will be. We all set our own limits about what we will, and will not, do and put up with.

 

[britechguy]

On the whole POP vs IMAP for4 ISP's and free email. Much of that started a few years after 2k.

Yes, and that was heading into 25 years ago. And I haven't encountered many people who are still on the same hardware they were before it became very widespread convention for email clients to automatically favor IMAP over POP when those are the two options.

Almost anyone on POP today is there for one reason: Intentional choice. If they just did what their latest version of {insert email client here} suggests, they'd be on IMAP unless they are dealing with a provider that only has POP, and those are now as rare as hen's teeth.

 

[nlinecomputers]

Almost anyone on POP today is there for one reason: Intentional choice.

Not necessarily. Plenty of people have had email accounts for years and just copy previous account settings and email to new systems. They never convert unless forced to do so. That’s exactly what appears to be the case here.

 

[britechguy]

Not necessarily.

Hence, "almost." I know of very few business users who've used POP for years because of the need to check email from multiple devices and keep everything in sync. Home users in my copious experience mostly don't know how to copy anything "under the hood" as far as anything goes.

I stand by the majority of cases of POP being used being deliberate (and, to be perfectly frank, stupid).

 

[JohnDoe1980]

I was able to convert the emails and folders into a PST which I imported into outlook. Some of the emails say they are from nobody@invalid.invalid and some say "from Demo".. I'm able to send emails but not receive. I spent hours on this yesterday trying to configure it.

 

[JohnDoe1980]

Also, the client is getting emails from their email service provider saying they have exceeded their storage limit. Maybe this is why emails are sending but aren't receiving.

 

[britechguy]

Also, the client is getting emails from their email service provider saying they have exceeded their storage limit. Maybe this is why emails are sending but aren't receiving.

Something's really, really off here.

If they were using POP, all storage long term should be local (as in on their machine) only. Every message that gets downloaded is purged somewhere between immediately afterward or a short time afterward UNLESS someone went in and tweaked POP settings to prevent this. The Sent folder should be local.

You have never said who the email service provider is, but it's a virtual certainty that they have a webmail interface. You really need to log in to this account via webmail to see "what's what" on the server side as the provider is seeing it. It's the only way (or only easy way) you are going to be able to accurately assess what the storage situation actually is.