Ran Anytime Upgrade on Vista Basic; "lost" my e-mails! HELP!

...and I am. The editorial is just that, my opinion. It does not "get in the way"...I do regret not mentioning that I am now and was then using Windows Mail. The OS was Windows Vista basic and I then put in Windows Vista Anytime Upgrade. No, I never backed up my e-mail, but I wish I had...I don't know how to. Windows has become so complicated in it's claim to be "more user friendly" I'm actually very hesitant to click on "help" because it never has been any kind of help!

As for reformatting, I didn't reformat, and I don't think the Anytime Upgrade is actually a format either, since all of these programs, EVERYTHING BUT MY E-MAILS that WAS on my computer before the Upgrade can be found in windows.old.

Trust me, I am very grateful for any help anyone takes the time to offer me, and I do not want to give the impression I'm not grateful...these things I'm searching for have consumed hours and hours of my time and they have irreplaceable value.

I was not given restore discs, nor do they come with the laptop I bought...another "money" issue. Yes, I should have done alot of things, but I didn't...I was in the middle of a personal crisis and didn't have the time. All I knew was that I had a new laptop, (new to me anyway) and I had alot of work to catch up on.

It's a Compaq Presario C502 laptop with an Intel processor, 1.86 GHZ. When I bought it it only had 512 mb of RAM, but I later added to that to make it a even 2 gigs. The hard drive is 80 gigs and is almost full, which is incredible to me since I am usually around 15 to 20 gigs. This, I'm sure is because there are repititive files being saved automatically on the partition, I guess, that is supposed to save a person in the event of no restore discs.

I appreciate any responses as long as they are not just to let me know how stupid I am...been there done that with myself, and I really don't need that kind of help.

My apologies for not being more thorough in the informational part of my post. Frustration and exasperation got the best of me...shame on me.

God Bless, thanks again, and I hope this addition to my post will be enough to bring me the answers I need.

SS_Wild_Child
P.S. I'm new to this forum, so if I'm out of bounds or am not posting in the "politically correct" manner, I apologize for that as well.

The one detail might be in there but as Joe Friday asked "Just the facts" seems to help when dealing with technical issues. YOUR CHOICE but you did complain about getting help but look at your post.

The facts needed to work the issues are either buried or missing.

I know you feel you should be able to write anyway you want and get help but how about putting the opinion piece into it's own post(s)?
Bob

It might work!
Windows.old/users/your username/appdata/local/microsoft/windows mail/localfolders
If Local Folders contains Inbox etc then you have your mail, back out and remember the path. Use import in windows mail in the new system to import the old messages.
You may have to show hidden files and folders to be able to see Appdata in the path above.
Good luck

If it works your old mail will be in a new folder called Imported Folder

aawwww, man! I was so excited to get your response, and thank you, by the way, for going the extra mile for me...however, I followed the trail and it ended almost immediately...no appdat file, I looked in other places, but...well, I've been there done that too. If you come up with any other suggestions, I will be ever so grateful...I am now anyway, even though this effort went south.

Thank you very much for taking the time anyway...anybody else out there have the magic key????

PLEASE?????

No more editorials, I promise...sorta. ( :

SS_Wild_Child

Right after I responded with the "hit a tree" post, I read yours again and had forgotten to make sure my computer was showing hidden files and folders AND I FOUND MY E-MAILS!!!!

YAY!!!! You are the greatest! I only have one more question, how do I import these e-mails to my...ANYWHERE, I don't really care, as long as I can access them. And do you know how I can back up my e-mails, or can you perhaps even suggest a better e-mail program that offers stationary and the ability to do the fancy stuff, including inserting pics?

Not trying to push my luck or anything, just figured, why not? You certainly are the hero of the day in MY BOOK!!!!

I'm leaving my file open until I get a response...scared of losing it you know?

Okay, so I've already lost it...that's a personal thing tho'.

Oh man, I'm THRILLED!!!!

Thank you from the bottom of my heart, thank you, thank you, thank you!!!!

SS_Wild_Child

I am assuming you are still using Vista so open windows mail and on the file menu click import/messages...
Choose microsoft windows mail 7 and next.
Click on browse and navigate to windows old\users\your username\appdata\local\microsoft\windows mail\local folders
At this point click the button Select Folder you will be returned to the dialogue box with the browse button but the blank box will now have the full path from C:\windows.old to Local Folders, click next.
Choose All folders or selected folders(select them or not)and click next.
If you have done it right all your old mail will be imported in individual boxes within a new folder called Imported Folder in windows mail.
If you have upgraded to windows 7 then it gets a bit more complicated because win 7 does not have a mail service included by default and you will have to set up something called Windows Live Mail and then use the import function in that application to import your old messages from the archive in Windows.old as described above.
There is lots of info on the net on both these cases search for Importing Messages Windows Mail for case 1 and Importing Messages Windows Mail to Live Mail for case 2

HTH

I tend to favour what used to be the default server from MS because you could be fairly certain that windows updates would be test for any bad effects on them while third party software had to catch up with environmental changes.
Now that MS have decided to not supply a default app but only to recomend their own product the same theory applies but not so strongly so the field is open.

I still don't know which flavour of windows you are going to be using but your coments re stationary etc don't fly because you can do what you want with windows mail, the message menu item, New Message Using, offers 10 stationary types and the oportunity to select others and the Insert menu in a New Message window allows you to insert pictures etc I assume Live Mail will have the same facilities, I havent tried that yet.

I tried step by step exactly what you said, including just trying to import "local folders" and just get them all, but every time, no matter what I did I got an error saying "either there are no messages in this folder, (which I know is not so) or the application that has them is running, close application and try again..."

Something to that effect. I apologize I didn't get the wording exactly right but that was basically what it said, and I tried it several times. I can't close Windows Mail because how else would I import the messages there?

I'm sorry, I didn't realize this would be such a pain, and I don't want to be a pain to anyone...perhaps you could tell me what I'm doing wrong, or even suggest another way to import these messages, even if it has to be to another e-mail account, I guess, I have several.

I just really don't want to screw them up now that I've found them, you know?

Thanks again for your patience and time, it is much appreciated.

SS_Wild_Child

Navigate to Windows.old\users\yourusername\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows Mail
Right click on the folder Local Folders and in the menu point to Send To, a sub menu will open, left click on Documents. This will copy the folder and its contents to Documents.
Now load windows mail and choose Import/messages on the file menu.
Highlight Microsoft Windows Mail 7 by left clicking once.
Click next.
In the next window click Browse.
Find the folder called Local Folders in Documents and highlight it.
At the bottom of that window there should be a button marked Select Folder, left click it.
This will return you to a window marked Location of Messages and in what was a blank space you should now see the path C:\Users\yourusername\Documents\Local Folders.
Click next
In the next window select All folders and click next.
After a short time the next window will say Import Complete.
Click finish.

In the folder list of windows mail you should now have a folder called imported folder with a small white triangle to the left, click on the triangle to expand the folder and show the folders with your messages in them.

Good Luck