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Recovering Thunderbird after a system crash

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  • Last reply by RLKnecht

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When updating my Win8.1 system the OS became corrupt and could not boot. I was able to get the data off of the disk, but I had to reinstall the OS. I want to put the recovered files back where Thunderbird uses them by default. My system was using 3 or 4 different email addresses and I would like to keep the old emails. In a default install what files are created and where are they located? The article online says to backup abd restore but that is not possible in my case. Thanks Rick

When updating my Win8.1 system the OS became corrupt and could not boot. I was able to get the data off of the disk, but I had to reinstall the OS. I want to put the recovered files back where Thunderbird uses them by default. My system was using 3 or 4 different email addresses and I would like to keep the old emails. In a default install what files are created and where are they located? The article online says to backup abd restore but that is not possible in my case. Thanks Rick

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I found it looking further through the help files. The default path is listed in "C:\Users\UserName\AppData{This folder is Hidden}\Roaming\Thunderbird\profiles.ini" on a line showing Path = .

 I copied the folder and pasted it in the profiles subfolder.  I also renamed the profiles.ini to profiles.temp.ini and copied over the old profiles.ini from the backup.  All works fine now and I have my old emails again.
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Chosen Solution

I found it looking further through the help files. The default path is listed in "C:\Users\UserName\AppData{This folder is Hidden}\Roaming\Thunderbird\profiles.ini" on a line showing Path = .

 I copied the folder and pasted it in the profiles subfolder.  I also renamed the profiles.ini to profiles.temp.ini and copied over the old profiles.ini from the backup.  All works fine now and I have my old emails again.