I have used Outlook Express on Windows 95,98,2000, XP since1996. Is there seemless email upgrade in Windows 7?

Question

Outlook Express has been a hallmark of Windows and Internet explorer for years. I have
a large address book, tens of thousands of emails in at least 12 folders, and dozens of mail
rules, many to fight spam { such as if subject line contains viagra move to spam } and
numerous mispelled versions. Other mail rules route certain emails to certain folders. Most
of my mail folders contain thousands of emails. I think there is seemless import to Vista's
Windows Mail. However Windows 7 does NOT have anything comparable to outlook express.

I would eventially like to move to Windows 7 64 bit on my best computer, I have RC1 and I liked
how it ran. But I don't want to give up the functionality I've had with Outlook Express, or spend
months trying to configure folders, address books and mail rules developed over years.

IS THERE A SEEMLESS replacement for Outlook Express which imports emails dbx files, Mail
Rules, address books and your POP accounts { I have 3}

Answer 1

I haven't yet tried Windows Mail on Windows 7 yet (I' still stuck with XP :-P) but from what I have seen it's a completely different thing than OE and I don't know how is the compatibility between the two.



A good OE alternative is Mozilla Thunderbird, I'm using the latest version and it's pretty cool, it can import all your messages and contacts from OE and I think the rules too. When you install it it will automatically ask you if you want to import your emails from another mail client. Give it a try http://www.mozillamessaging.com/en-US/thunderbird/



You said that you have created a lot of rules to fight spam, well I was struggling with that too a while ago then I found Gmail. I think it's the best email service out there, you have 7.5GB for your emails, its spam filter gets rid of 99.9% of the spam in my inbox, it has a great user interface, you can download the emails using POP3 or IMAP and if you don't want to change email address you can let gmail download the emails from your current account (getting rid of the spam in the process) and send emails using your old address so that no one will have to know your gmail address.

Answer 2

You cannot upgrade directly from Windows XP to Windows 7. Period. It will not carry over your files. Period. You can buy the cheaper "upgrade" version of Windows 7 because you already have XP, and you can "upgrade" your operating system to a more recent version, but you can not directly "upgrade" and have your files, settings, etc. carry over as most people want. You will technically be forced to do a full fresh install, even if you have the "upgrade" version. Period. I didn't make it this way, Microsoft did. And I answered a whole whole ton of questions about this when Windows 7 came out. It would probably be wise to go with Windows 7 at this point if your computer can handle it and the guy at the shop will do it for you without a high price. However, you'll need to back up anything critical if you want to keep it. Your files will NOT still be there. The smartest thing to do (if you can afford it) is for the guy in the shop to put a brand new hard drive in your computer and to install Windows 7 to that. You can then still connect remotely to your old hard drive, and pull off any files that are still there. If your old hard drive was the core problem (which the guy in the shop should be able to eventually tell), this protects you. And if it's not, you can now use it as a backup drive instead. But anyone telling you it's no problem to "upgrade" or that you have a choice between an upgrade and a full installation or that your files will still be there for you is wrong. XP to Windows 7 is *always* a clean install, but it can be done with the cheaper "upgrade" version of the software.

Answer 3

The replacement for OE is Windows Live Mail, downloadable as part of Live Essentials.



Whether you can import all your old mails etc, I'm not sure - never tried.

Answer 4

Windows Live Mail is a seamless e-mail upgrade for Windows 7.