MS Apps- Save Settings to disk during formatting of HD

b20uvkft6m5xwg

Ok I'm in the process of preparing for a big OS upgrade and formatting of the HD and I want to copy as many settings as I can from some MS apps onto disk to reinstall- for instance.....

Outlook Express-
I want to know is there anyway to export all my existing messages from my outlook express to disk- and not just purely another email app on my HD like Outlook or Eudora

There are tons that I want/need to keep and I frankly dont want to forward them to my webmail and then have to re-download them-

For instance, I have copied all the a/c settings, message rules etc from the harddisk but are the actual .eml files on my HD somewhere because so far I cant find them atm !?

MS Word-
Also I dont dont know whether this is possible...
I'm exporting as many setttings as possible from MS word- ie Normal template- customised toolbars etc. but is there any way to export the "auto correct" settings- for instance I type "ct" and the word "court" appears- I have loads of these little things set-up but cant seem to figure out whether I can export them as of yet??

If anyone can think of anything else I may overlook and then regret- along the lines of IE favorites folder etc. let me know from your experience:)

Thx in Advance
80p.

Frank Grimes

Outlook Express stores the messages in .dbx files.
Do a search for *.dbx and you'll find 'em. Just copy them somewhere else, and when you reinstall you can just copy them back. They're usually in c:\windows\application data\identities\<mad folder name>
If you copy the dbx files to a cd, make sure that when you copy them back that you untick read only in the file properties. OE won't be able to use 'em if they're read only.

As for MS Word, I ain't sure - I don't use it

amp

Word:
I'm fairly sure these are stored in normal.dot. Just search and copy all normal.dots and you should be ok

b20uvkft6m5xwg

Thx Lads

Frank your on the money there:)
Although I did try to do likewise with OE 6 on win XP and I couldn't- I wonder have the changed the way they store msgs- becuase I couldn't find any .dbx files

I'm upgrading to Win2k on my desktop and then installing it on my laptop so I hope they they will export there. If not I have the .dbx files which can also be read through notepad- so I wont have lost them completly.

amp:
Yep it does get exported with the normal.dot- but for some reason some Ive had to re-enter the shortcut keys as they dont export with them- but as above I have a list of them and that shouldn't take too long to tinker with:)

thx lads:)

Frank Grimes

80project, I just took a look on my XP box. For some reason doing a search for dbx files didn't bring any up either. But, in OE go into the Tools menu > Options, click on the Maintenance tab and then click on the Store Folder button, and that'll tell you where they are.

donaloconnor

I know how to do this with Outlook XP and Windows XP.

Goto start->Run. type in

C:\documents and settings\[User]\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook\Microsoft\Outlook

where C:\ is your drive that xp is installed on and [User] is the user account you are using.

In that folder you will find two files: extend.dat and outlook.pst.

Copy these and then when you have your new version of windows and outlook, simply overwrite these files with the ones you backed up.

hope this helps!

Frank Grimes

Outlook Express doesn't use .pst files, the dbx files are stored in a path similar to that one.

b20uvkft6m5xwg

The .dbx files moved over nicely as did the normal.dot
Pity there is no way to export the message rules like the a/c settings in Outlook express:( That took me ages to update!

All has worked well so far with my desktop pc and I'm still waiting to install it on laptop.

Just a quick tip for anyone....

DONT FORGET TO BACKUP YOUR WINAMP SKINS !!!
Uurrrggghh, I completly forgot- 3 years of collecting gone-
I cant believe I forgot to save them:rolleyes:

Clinical Waste

You didn't forget your Outlook Address book did you?

b20uvkft6m5xwg

Thankfully not!!

A rafter and a rope would have already interveined if I had

WhiteWashMan

can you not just copy your profile over and save it and then restore it?

b20uvkft6m5xwg

I couldnt figure it out anyway WWM, but if anyone thinks that its possible let us all know

PhilipMarlowe

Originally posted by 80project
...Pity there is no way to export the message rules like the a/c settings in Outlook express:( That took me ages to update!...

General how to Back Up and restore OE stuff
How to deal with blocked senders list and mail rules

There's a bit of registry tweaking needed to deal with the mail rules and stuff....

Frank Grimes

Outlook Express is limited in what it can do, properly exporting an identity is a big one. Read any of the posts on OE related newsgroups, the same "how can I export..." questions pop up all the time. Maybe they'll come up with a decent export facility in the future, but it's all basically a case of manually exporting things at the moment.

Frank Grimes

This is a pretty good site:

http://www.tomsterdam.com/insideOE/index.htm

Info. on everything OE related.

WhiteWashMan

Originally posted by 80project
I couldnt figure it out anyway WWM, but if anyone thinks that its possible let us all know

well, if you are using an OS that uses profile (ie. nt, win2k, XP, not sure about ME coz i only used it for 5 seconds and then formatted the hd) you will have user profiles, and all you have to do is right click on the profile you want to save and copy it to disk or whatever.
it should have all the settings for your apps and printers and all sorts of wonderful stuff in there.
then all you have to do is reinstall your os, and copy the folder back into the profiles folder and create a user account and call your new profile folder whatever name youve given the account.

but i dont know if this works with express or not as its a funny old program.

in fact this probably didnt help you at all, but at least you will know in future

b20uvkft6m5xwg

Yep I've found with xp that most of the personal settings are in the "PC" users a/c and not somewhere like the system or windows folder as per normal, and also I think as Frank Grimes said most of them dont come very easily in a search for some reason !?

For example I wanted to change the "right click | send to" folder- So I did a search, thinking it would be in the Windows folder, but nothing came up- so i did a check on windows-help.net (I think) and found out its in the "c: documents and settings\user..." folder and it still didn't come up in a search of "all files and folders" or an advanced seacrh of file containg text...!!??

[Cornish Accent]
'Dem Darn compooters are strange beings !!
[/Cornish Accent]

PhilipMarlowe

Under 2k it comes up in the standard search once you have hidden files and folders set to "show"
My Computer | Tools menu | Folder Options | View tab | Show hidden files and folders