Getting O.E. Messages from "XP" Hard Drive of Crashed Motherboard

[Guest]

Thus far, after considerable time and funds spent, I've managed to retrieve
all of my Files, Documents, Favorites/Bookmarks, and Contacts from my old
Hard Drive via another "XP" Computer, however, "Vista" evidently doesn't
recognize my "Messages" and Folders from O.E. for Importing into Windows Mail.

I had to resort to a Tech with the proper disk to remove the Permissions in
order to retrieve the Favorites/Bookmarks and Contacts, and the DBX message
files as well, copied to a CD for transfer. [The other Documents & Files
transfered {after copying to the main HD of the other "XP" system} with WET
connected with only a CAT5 cable.]

However, although the Favorites/Bookmarks and Contacts/Address Book and
messages were all copied to Folders on the Desktop from the CD, the Messages
are the only ones which wouldn't Import. Same with trying to Transfer with
WET.
The message files on the 1st CD were Transferred with WET, but the ones on
the 2nd CD were not recognized even for Transferring to the Desktop Folder.

Any suggestions on HOW to finally import my O.E. Messages and Folders from
the old Hard Drive [using an external USB Adapter/Converter Cable, Vista
recognized that the Hard Drive was there, but considered the Drive as Empty,
needing Formatting. Installing it in the new computer wouldn't work in any
configuration either.]

 

[Michael Jennings]

You need to know the right way to ask the question to get a good answer.
For example, if you Google the magic incantation "OE2WM" you get this:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=OE2WM

Again and again in the series of hits that gets, after the first, you see this:
http://www.oehelp.com/backup.aspx#oe2wm

 

[Guest]

Thank you for your link [Obviously, I can't "Backup" though, at this point].
I'd already gotten a response from a Microsoft Tech in India whom said
something similar. After moving my CD #1 from the Desktop to a file in
"Documents", I was able to Import it O.K.

However, even though the 2nd CD has similar DBX files, shows all of them in
Windows Explorer, and I was told to also copy "folders.dbx" to that file as
well, the WM Import would not recognize the files as even existing, but keep
showing an empty file.

I like having the ones from CD #1, but I really need two Folders which are
on CD#2. And, I don't have the time to wait, nor wish to expend funds
necessary just to purchase the OEX program, especially when I don't know if
it will even work.

:

You need to know the right way to ask the question to get a good answer. For
example, if you Google the magic incantation "OE2WM" you get this:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=OE2WM

Again and again in the series of hits that gets, after the first, you see
this: http://www.oehelp.com/backup.aspx#oe2wm

This email was cleaned by emailStripper, available for free from
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[Michael Jennings]

Steve's oe2wm explanation has no pretty pictures - no screen shots. For
that, you'd need to click on some of those other links Google coughs up.
Being able to do a restore is part of backup. Your restore is partial.

If you don't really need the two folders on CD #2, then blow them off.
As you point out, there might be nothing in them. You could check
that *if* you have access to an XP computer - try an import into OE,
or gamble $7 on Cochran's DBXtract, which works on XP. Neither
OEX nor DBXtract will find anything if there is nothing to be found -
the same as a data recovery expert would have to explain to you.

WinMail isn't as fragile as Outlook Express, so the occurrences of gobs
of lost messages should diminish. Of course, with restorable backups,
all of the lost messages could have been recovered. Too difficult?