Windows Live Mail Client = Easiest Mail Backup Ever?

Posted Jun 13, 2008 by Rich Menga  

One widely unknown feature of Outlook Express and the Windows Live Mail client is how easy it is to backup your mail locally (to which you can then burn to CD/DVD, put on a USB stick, etc.) Even if you’re not using Hotmail, you can easily back up any POP or IMAP account by a simple drag’n'drop to a local folder. You could even backup Gmail easily using the WLmail client.

See video below for details.

Which Of These Traits Applies To YOUR Computing Life?...

9 Responses to “Windows Live Mail Client = Easiest Mail Backup Ever?”

  1. Dina says:

    awsome thing ^^.Thanks for the tip

  2. craig says:

    Hi
    Could not get it to export to my external hard drive but got it to work in a folder in mydocuments. Shame that microsoft could not add a back up facility which you can set the time it backsup or only backs up what has changed. Maybe they will get to it soon.

  3. Michael says:

    Easiest email backup for Windows? Probably. Easiest email backup ever? Wrong.

    Microsoft Entourage for Macintosh takes that prize. Copy one folder and you’ve backed up all of your email messages, mail settings, calendar settings, events, address books, and everything else that configures the program. Just copy that folder back to any other computer and you’ve got a perfect restoration of all of your important data.

  4. Rob Sitter says:

    You could always be like me and write your own simple batch files, you know, the hands on approach:

    robocopy “Dirs” “C:\Users\Robert M. Sitter\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail” /E /B
    regedit /s “Reg\reg.reg”
    pause

  5. Rob Sitter says:

    I MEANT TO SAY:
    set bp=%CD%\Backups\WindowsLiveMail

    md “%bp%”
    md “%bp%\Dirs”
    md “%bp%\Reg”

    robocopy “%LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail” “%bp%\Dirs” /E /B
    reg export “hkcu\Software\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail” “%bp%\Reg\reg.reg”

    del “%bp%\restore.bat”
    ECHO robocopy “Dirs” “%LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail” /E /B>>”%bp%\restore.bat”
    ECHO regedit /s “Reg\reg.reg”>>”%bp%\restore.bat”
    ECHO pause>>”%bp%\restore.bat”

  6. Rob Sitter says:

    set bp=%CD%\Backups\WindowsLiveMail

    md “%bp%”
    md “%bp%\Dirs”
    md “%bp%\Reg”

    robocopy “%LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail” “%bp%\Dirs” /E /B
    reg export “hkcu\Software\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail” “%bp%\Reg\reg.reg”

    del “%bp%\restore.bat”
    ECHO robocopy “Dirs” “%LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail” /E /B>>”%bp%\restore.bat”
    ECHO regedit /s “Reg\reg.reg”>>”%bp%\restore.bat”
    ECHO pause>>”%bp%\restore.bat”

  7. Rob Sitter says:

    Oops, I meant to say –>
    set bp=%CD%\Backups\WindowsLiveMail

    md “%bp%”
    md “%bp%\Dirs”
    md “%bp%\Reg”

    robocopy “%LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail” “%bp%\Dirs” /E /B
    reg export “hkcu\Software\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail” “%bp%\Reg\reg.reg”

    del “%bp%\restore.bat”
    ECHO robocopy “Dirs” “%LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail” /E /B>>”%bp%\restore.bat”
    ECHO regedit /s “Reg\reg.reg”>>”%bp%\restore.bat”
    ECHO pause>>”%bp%\restore.bat”

  8. Rob Sitter says:

    Oops, I meant to say –>

    set bp=%CD%\Backups\WindowsLiveMail

    md “%bp%”
    md “%bp%\Dirs”
    md “%bp%\Reg”

    robocopy “%LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail” “%bp%\Dirs” /E /B
    reg export “hkcu\Software\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail” “%bp%\Reg\reg.reg”

    del “%bp%\restore.bat”
    ECHO robocopy “Dirs” “%LOCALAPPDATA%\Microsoft\Windows Live Mail” /E /B>>”%bp%\restore.bat”
    ECHO regedit /s “Reg\reg.reg”>>”%bp%\restore.bat”
    ECHO pause>>”%bp%\restore.bat”

  9. Garin says:

    Great tip.
    Is there a way to incoporate this with auto backup software?
    I am trying to figure out a way that my backup of windows live mail can be done automatically daily, like I do with my other data.
    Thank you.

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