Moving multiple profiles from outlook 2000 on win98 to outlook 2002 on XP pro machines

[Elliott]

We are in the process of upgrading our computers from win98 with
outlook 2000 to XP pro with outlook 2002. We are changing out all of
the workstation hardware. I have all of the workstations set up with
outlook 2000 with as many as 20 profiles, for different users, on each
machine. All of the profiles are pop3 accounts, and the .pst files are
located on a central file server (not on the workstations). Is there a
way to export the user profiles and import them onto the new machines.
When the original accounts were set up the users changed thier
passwords, so I would have to hunt down and sit down with each of the
employees for approximately 400 profiles to put into the new machines.
There has to be a way to just move the profiles to the new machines.
Any ideas would be welcome. Thanks in advance.

 

[Lanwench [MVP - Exchange]]

We are in the process of upgrading our computers from win98 with
outlook 2000 to XP pro with outlook 2002. We are changing out all of
the workstation hardware. I have all of the workstations set up with
outlook 2000 with as many as 20 profiles, for different users, on each
machine. All of the profiles are pop3 accounts,

and the .pst files
are located on a central file server (not on the workstations).

Accessing PST files over a LAN/WAN connection is not supported by
Microsoft - you can do this, but I do *not* recommend it, particularly with
that many users. Performance will be poor, and you will likely experience
data corruption on a regular basis. Also, if you have that many users, it's
time to look into something like Exchange server. SBS2003 is affordable -
your current configuration sounds like a real administrative nightmare to
me.

Is

there a way to export the user profiles and import them onto the new
machines. When the original accounts were set up the users changed
thier passwords, so I would have to hunt down and sit down with each
of the employees for approximately 400 profiles to put into the new
machines. There has to be a way to just move the profiles to the new
machines. Any ideas would be welcome. Thanks in advance.

Win9x profiles & WinXP profiles are not compatible. (neither are Win2k/WinXP
ones, really, either). I don't know how you can export a Win9x profile to a
WinXP one. You can certainly copy the PST files wherever you wish, but you
will have to recreate the mail profiles & email accounts. Since this is
going to be a real PITA, my preference would be, get Exchange in the
picture, and only have to deal with this sort of thing *once*. You can get
everyone off POP & PST files at the same time.