what space does your provider allocate for your account? Quota? perhaps the issue is more one of account size.

Matt said

what space does your provider allocate for your account? Quota? perhaps the issue is more one of account size.

I haven't checked with her ISP BellSouth but online info says that there is a 2 gig limit at which point incoming email will be returned to the sender. I just sent her an email and she can received it to the server but the server won't download to her machine. BellSouth uses POP accounts if that matters.

I'm still suspicious that the inbox file size didn't change at the last compacting. Should I go archive more and compact to test?

I must admit Compacting should change the file size, even if there is only a single deleted email to be purged. But the size is to small for that error. 4Gb is where we should be seeing that error message. Even under ancient OSX and Linux builds it is 2Gb Hence my question.

The next question is what about anti virus. Thunderbird might think it can not get more space because the file is locked (For scanning is my guess) so it throws an error about the size of the file.

OR it is another inbox file. Make sure the folder view is set to all. View Menu (alt+V) > folders > all Compact using the file menu (Alt+F) and select compact. That compacts ALL folders, not just the one selected.

I had her delete some more and compact. The inbox file size did decrease. I also uninstalled her virus program Eset. Am still getting the same "Inbox full" error message. The inbox size in 1,437,094 kb. inbox.msf also decreased and is 8,542 kb.

She needs to get back to work. Can a new profile use a completely new directory? Her current email data is stored in Data>EmailData>Thunderbird.

I could add another Profile and create another directory perhaps Thunderbird_09.04.2016 for anything done today forward and let her switch Profiles if she needs something from the nonworking set. I could also archive everything and manually copy the archive folders to the new directory.

If this will work, are there any gotchas?

Before you do that, disable the windows indexing service and see if that has an impact. The default location of Thunderbird profiles is not included in it's reach. The location you are suggesting is in use would definitely be included. Is it even on the same disk as the operating system?

The Thunderbird data is in a non-standard folder on the same HD as the system. I normally keep it on a separate partition at least and usually another HD but haven't on this machine. This machine and my other were working fine before this.

I turned off (disabled) indexing following these directions.

http://www.softwareok.com/?seite=faq-Windows-10&faq=53

restarted then made sure indexing was off. Then tried to download and received the same error massage.

Next I deleted the inbox emails using the normal Thunderbird delete function, compacted after first copying the Inbox & Inbox.msf folders to another drive for safe keeping and making sure that they were the correct size and could be used if needed.

After a restart, Thunderbird checks the server, doesn't download and gives NO error message. I haven't looked for any logs.

What should I try next?

I actually think no error message is better than the one with rubbish in it.

What anti virus product are you using. I would suggest an exception for the folder that have the profile. They should never be scanned on update and moving them to a non standard location means this is probably happening. Files locked to scan would appear to the software as full perhaps.

open the error console Ctrl+Shift +J Clear it and attempt to get mail. Anything likely appear?

Antivirus uninstalled.

Thunderbird log after clearing and attempting to download:

Timestamp: 9/7/2016 10:37:03 PM Error: An error occurred executing the cmd_getNewMessages command: [Exception... "Component returned failure code: 0x8055000a [nsIMsgIncomingServer.getNewMessages]" nsresult: "0x8055000a (<unknown>)" location: "JS frame :: chrome://messenger/content/mailWindowOverlay.js :: GetNewMsgs :: line 2723" data: no] Source File: chrome://global/content/globalOverlay.js Line: 103

Please add the troubleshooting information to your post To find the Troubleshooting information:

• Open Help (or click on three-line-icon and select Help)
• Choose Troubleshooting Information
• Use the button Copy to clipboard to select all. Do not check box "Include account names"!
• Paste this in your post.

Please also add the result of these troubleshooting steps to your post

• Does Thunderbird work in TB Safe mode (see Thunderbird Safe Mode)?

Whether in normal mode or Safe mode, TB downloads anywhere less than 500 messages and stops with the error message. "The RETR command did not succeed. Error retrieving a message. Mail server inboundatt.net responded: problem retrieving message."

The troubleshooting info below was copied after entering safe mode and the download stopped. I had opened and closed the troubleshooting before safe mode and this data likely includes both before and after safe mode. Shockwave Flash 21.0 which is set to "Ask to activate". Others are disabled.

Troubleshooting data in next post:

Application Basics

   Name: Thunderbird
   Version: 45.3.0
   User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; WOW64; rv:45.0) Gecko/20100101 Thunderbird/45.3.0
   Profile Folder: Show Folder

             (Local drive)
   Application Build ID: 20160825102941
   Enabled Plugins: about:plugins
   Build Configuration: about:buildconfig
   Memory Use: about:memory

 Mail and News Accounts
   account1:
     INCOMING: account1, , (pop3) inbound.att.net:995, SSL, passwordCleartext
     OUTGOING: , outbound.att.net:465, SSL, passwordCleartext, true

   account2:
     INCOMING: account2, , (none) Local Folders, plain, passwordCleartext

 Crash Reports

 Extensions
   Lightning, 4.7.3, false, {e2fda1a4-762b-4020-b5ad-a41df1933103}

 Important Modified Preferences

   Name: Value

     accessibility.typeaheadfind.flashBar: 0
     browser.cache.disk.capacity: 358400
     browser.cache.disk.filesystem_reported: 1
     browser.cache.disk.smart_size_cached_value: 358400
     browser.cache.disk.smart_size.first_run: false
     browser.cache.disk.smart_size.use_old_max: false
     dom.apps.reset-permissions: true
     extensions.lastAppVersion: 45.3.0
     font.name.monospace.el: Consolas
     font.name.monospace.x-cyrillic: Consolas
     font.name.monospace.x-unicode: Consolas
     font.name.monospace.x-western: Consolas
     font.name.sans-serif.el: Calibri
     font.name.sans-serif.x-cyrillic: Calibri
     font.name.sans-serif.x-unicode: Calibri
     font.name.sans-serif.x-western: Calibri
     font.name.serif.el: Cambria
     font.name.serif.x-cyrillic: Cambria
     font.name.serif.x-unicode: Cambria
     font.name.serif.x-western: Cambria
     font.size.fixed.el: 14
     font.size.fixed.x-cyrillic: 14
     font.size.fixed.x-unicode: 14
     font.size.fixed.x-western: 14
     font.size.variable.el: 17
     font.size.variable.x-cyrillic: 17
     font.size.variable.x-unicode: 17
     font.size.variable.x-western: 17
     gfx.crash-guard.glcontext.appVersion: 45.3.0
     gfx.crash-guard.glcontext.deviceID: 0x990e
     gfx.crash-guard.glcontext.driverVersion: 15.201.1151.1008
     gfx.crash-guard.glcontext.gfx.driver-init.direct3d11-angle: true
     gfx.crash-guard.glcontext.gfx.driver-init.webgl-angle: true
     gfx.crash-guard.glcontext.gfx.driver-init.webgl-angle-force-d3d11: false
     gfx.crash-guard.glcontext.gfx.driver-init.webgl-angle-force-warp: false
     gfx.crash-guard.glcontext.gfx.driver-init.webgl-angle-try-d3d11: true
     gfx.crash-guard.status.glcontext: 2
     mail.openMessageBehavior.version: 1
     mail.winsearch.firstRunDone: true
     mailnews.database.global.datastore.id: b1d4a282-6915-4259-b496-b9046e5a960
     network.cookie.prefsMigrated: true
     network.predictor.cleaned-up: true
     places.database.lastMaintenance: 1472957853
     places.history.expiration.transient_current_max_pages: 104858
     plugin.importedState: true

 Graphics

     Adapter Description: AMD Radeon HD 8570D
     Vendor ID: 0x1002
     Device ID: 0x990e
     Adapter RAM: 768
     Adapter Drivers: aticfx64 aticfx64 aticfx64 amdxc64 aticfx32 aticfx32 aticfx32 amdxc32 atiumd64 atidxx64 atidxx64 atiumdag atidxx32 atidxx32 atiumdva atiumd6a atitmm64
     Driver Version: 15.201.1151.1008
     Driver Date: 11-4-2015
     Direct2D Enabled: false
     DirectWrite Enabled: false (10.0.10586.494)
     ClearType Parameters: ClearType parameters not found
     WebGL Renderer: false
     GPU Accelerated Windows: 0

     AzureCanvasBackend: skia
     AzureSkiaAccelerated: 0
     AzureFallbackCanvasBackend: cairo
     AzureContentBackend: cairo

 JavaScript

 Incremental GC: 1

 Accessibility

   Activated: 0
   Prevent Accessibility: 0

 Library Versions

     Expected minimum version
     Version in use

     NSPR
     4.12
     4.12

     NSS
     3.21.1 Basic ECC
     3.21.1 Basic ECC

     NSS Util
     3.21.1
     3.21.1

     NSS SSL
     3.21.1 Basic ECC
     3.21.1 Basic ECC

     NSS S/MIME
     3.21.1 Basic ECC
     3.21.1 Basic ECC

There are 40,000 messages on the server. I emptied the inbox by archiving, deleting or just plain moving all messages. TB will download periodically download a couple of hundred messages before throwing an error message

"The RETR command did not succeed. Error retrieving a message. Mail server inbound.att.net responded: problem retrieving message."

Below are the 1st 3 errors from the error console.

Timestamp: 9/9/2016 7:10:07 PM Warning: Unknown descriptor 'panose-1' in @font-face rule. Skipped to next declaration. Source File: about:blank Line: 11, Column: 9 Source Code:

panose-1:2 11 6 4 3 5 4 4 2 4;}

Timestamp: 9/9/2016 7:10:07 PM

Warning: Unknown property 'mso-style-priority'. Declaration dropped. Source File: about:blank Line: 19, Column: 20 Source Code:

{mso-style-priority:99;

Timestamp: 9/9/2016 7:10:07 PM Warning: Expected '{' to begin declaration block but found 'WordSection1'. Source File: about:blank Line: 33, Column: 6 Source Code: @page WordSection1

Edit: TB now downloads some messages everytime I click the Get Messages button. It still stops after 200-300. Te number of messages downloaded isn't consistent. I cleared the error console and there are no more messages even after it stops downloading.