Computer newbies: How do I back-up e-mails
I've never been able to get
by TONI H - 12/3/05 2:07 PM In reply to: Re: opening dbx by Kees Bakker
the files imported from a cd...I've always had to copy them back to a folder on my harddrive (usually the desktop) and then import from there instead. Then I just delete/erase the folder with a shredder program and my backup is still on the cd for safekeeping.
TONI
Shredder Program??
by jayfin - 12/28/05 7:57 AM In reply to: I've never been able to get by TONI HI find that I have to copy CD back to hard drive and have deleted the folder but have not used a shredder program. What is it and how would I get one?
John
There are many and some are free
by TONI H - 12/28/05 3:48 PM In reply to: Shredder Program?? by jayfinI hppen to use a program called Mutilator that I paid for, but Eraser works very well and it's free and recommended by many here in the forums.
http://www.pcwarfare.com/hdds/erase.hdd.htm
You can use it to erase individual files or whole drives...
TONI
Thanks for the info
by jayfin - 12/29/05 5:26 PM In reply to: There are many and some are free by TONI HNow I now what a shredder is but haven't the faintest idea how I would go about finding the right files to shred; such as those files that contain the information I gave to Amazon.com when I order a book or to my bank when I transferred funds from one account to another. I am sure that information is there somewhere but I don't think I have the expertise to find it.
John
Curious.
by Cursorcowboy - 12/29/05 5:00 AM In reply to: I've never been able to get by TONI HThen I just delete/erase the folder with a shredder program and my backup is still on the cd for safekeeping.
I read that before and now curious minds would like to know?
Why would a process such as this be used to ensure overwrites if actual OE mail exists on the hard drive anyway -- assuming it does routinely?
Lady! I don't think you have anything to hide?
Hope you have a happy New Year and that Santa was VERY good to you.
It's getting routine for me
by TONI H - 12/29/05 5:56 AM In reply to: Curious. by Cursorcowboyto use my 'eraser'.....since I right click anyhow to delete something, and then it goes into the recycle bin, that then has to be emptied, too, I get a right click option with the eraser program to just erase it and eliminate the rest of the steps. My recycle bin is always empty now....and I don't have to worry about data that might be restored when I don't ever want it to be.
When the eraser program does its thing, the empty space on the drive is always cleaned up (it took awhile for the first 'erase/overwrite the empty space' function recently when I cleaned out every partition (I have 11 between three drives installed plus I had another drive temporarily hooked up to get data from it as well as an external USB drive so I had a total of 14 'drives' at one point), but once all the partitions were cleaned up and the empty space on each was overwritten, I've noticed a considerable amount of better organization and after defragging each drive, the speeds on searching has gotten faster as well.
This may easily be my optimistic fantasy due to the enthusiasm over finally having a clean house to work with again after years of chaos that I 'thought' was organization, but I'm much happier with these results than with what I had before.
Now...if I can only figure out how come my Ulead graphics program keeps telling me I can't save a new .jpg file in the My Pictures folder anymore (error says it's 'read only') when I can save it anywhere else and then move it with no problem.....
TONI
Hi..Like your idea but have a question
by orianna - 12/2/05 4:30 AM In reply to: Here Is What I Do by dcmorrisOnce you've saved the files on the desktop, what is the procedure for putting them back...the same way you tranferred them out of OE? I need to uninstall OE because of some corrupted files, and I don't want to lose all my email. Also, is there a way to save my contacts too?
Thanks
Way to save contacts from Outlook Express...
by glenn30 - 12/2/05 8:15 AM In reply to: Hi..Like your idea but have a question by oriannaOpen Outlook Express then ''Addresses'' button to open ''Address Book - Main Idenity''. From the file menue choose ''Export/Address Book (WAB''... follow the prompts and save to a location of your choice. I save mine to a floppy disk or zip drive.
Best of luck!
Glenn
Sorry, orianna, But
by dcmorris - 12/3/05 4:45 PM In reply to: Hi..Like your idea but have a question by oriannaI don't have an answer to your question. Once I have saved them to the desktop I copy them to a CD and that is where they stay.
I have never seen a need of moving them back to OE.
I have considered printing them but that seemed redundant.
DC
This is how I save OE files.....
by covermejoey - 12/2/05 2:50 AM In reply to: How do I back-up e-mails by chrisypFollow this path...
C:\Documents and Settings\NOYB!\Local Settings\Application Data\Identities\{F8A29A76-5940-41B9-BD82-A05D72863CE1}\Microsoft\Outlook Express
OK,now you'll find the .dbx's here.
These little buggers are how all your mail files are saved
If you want to "make room",or save, I just place an "X" in front of the name of the one I want to save.Like so.
renamed---> Xinbox.dbx/old name---> inbox.dbx .
When you restart OE it will make a new one (.dbx) because of the "X" it no longer will see your old "files".
Now, you could take all your .dbx's and copy them to disk,and when you need to get an old emile back, just place an say a "Y" on your new one,remove the "X" on the old one,open OE and it will now show all your old emails.
You can also leave the "old" .dbx's in the OE folder too,as I said before,with the "X" in front of it OE will not see it.
There you have it,I hope this works for you.
"S"
V^^^^V
RE: How do I back-up e-mails
by ding60 - 12/2/05 8:55 AM In reply to: How do I back-up e-mails by chrisypIf you're doing a drag-n-drop method to copy your messages out of OE, they're probably being saved as a .msg file. Same for the .dbx rename/copy schemes-.dbx is a message 'database' that OE uses to store sets of messages (the 'folders' in OE).
These are binary files, not plain text files, that are proprietary to Outlook. If you try to open it in Word or Notepad, you see the squares and other thingies when a byte doesn't equate to a 'real' character like 'a'.
If you're saving the messages individually (the DnD method), you can DnD them back into Outlook for viewing. You might be able to point OE at your CD-based .msg or .dbx files, but I don't use OE, so I can't tell you if you can use OE to open files outside OE's normal folders.
problem identified but not solved
by chrisyp - 12/2/05 9:06 AM In reply to: RE: How do I back-up e-mails by ding60Yes, you have identified the problem I have in your second paragraph. It looks as though I'm not going to be able to retrieve the ones I saved on cd but must try another method of saving to cd.
At the moment I'm trying out some of the other answers but haven't cracked it yet.
Saving, burning, and restoring
by TONI H - 12/2/05 9:26 AM In reply to: problem identified but not solved by chrisypHow I do it
and I don't use the Store Folder because I'm of the opinion (mine alone) that it actually contains your original mail but in a different 'default' location, and windows can't import the mail back from a folder that already contains the mail files.
Go to Search and for files and folders (click Advanced and make sure hidden and system files/folders are checked), and type *.DBX
now create a folder on your desktop called OLDMAIL and go back to the search window. Click Edit, Select All and when they are all highlighted, right drag the files all at once to the folder and let the mouse button go...choose COPY HERE.
Now open OE, click File/Import/Messages/Mail and browse to the folder on your desktop and click it open.......WHAM.......all the mail is back in OE slicker than a hot knife in butter.
If you want to now burn your email to a cd for safekeeping, burn the OLDMAIL folder on the desktop...then you can delete the folder to save room.
You can also, if you don't keep deleted and sent emails, delete the Deleted Items.DBX and Sent Items.DBX files since they are nearly always huge files.
Then when you are in OE, go to Tools/Options/Advanced and put a checkmark in "empty deleted upon exit" and it will remove from your harddrive all deleted mail once you close OE...just because the folder in OE is empty doesn't mean they aren't building up as a huge file on the harddrive. Go then to Send tab in Options, and take the check mark out of "keep a copy"....if you have email you want to save, just put your own email address into the BCC line of the mail and it will mail a copy of what you said right back to you. Create a new folder in OE to store those specific emails instead.
To burn to a cd properly, make sure you are using a burning program that gives you the option to create a DATA cd, then go to the OLDMAIL folder and burn it all at once to the cd.
In order to view the files correctly, you will need to change the File Types default viewer in Windows Explorer for .DBX files to open in Outlook Express....evidently you tried to view them at one time in Wordpad or Word and left the checkmark in the small box that says 'always use this program to view files of this type', so that's what's trying to open them now. HOWEVER, KEEP READING BECAUSE I DON'T HONESTLY THINK YOU HAVE A PROBLEM WITH HOW YOU BURNED IT OR VIEWED IT. YOU JUST DON'T UNDERSTAND WHAT YOU'RE LOOKING AT IMMEDIATELY SO IT CAN BE CONFUSING UNTIL YOU UNDERSTAND HOW DBX FILES WORK.
If you can't figure out how to change the default viewer, you can go to any .dbx file on your harddrive (use Search and type *.dbx to get them quickly and make sure you have looked at the Advanced button to put check marks in 'look in hidden and system folders' or Search won't find them. Once you have the list of .dbx files, highlight one of them, hold down the shift key, and right click that file...you will now see that you have two options for OPEN and OPEN WITH... let go of the shift key, and Choose OPEN WITH and go down the list until you see Outlook Express. Make sure there is a check mark in the box that says 'use this program' and then click Outlook Express. All .dbx files will again open with Outlook Express.........BUT
DBX files are very large and cannot be opened as a WHOLE file with Outlook Express because they contain many, many individual emails. And many if not most of those emails are written in HTML format, not regular text. So just because you cannot see anything but code when you try to view the actual .dbx file, if you scroll far enough after temporarily opening the file in Wordpad or Word, you will eventually get passed all the HTML coding of one individual email (they will be listed with the newest email at the top of the whole file list), and you will get to the actual typed text of the email message.
This is good for when you want to do a search for just one particular email, because once you have the .dbx file (which is really a folder and not a file in Outlook Express) opened in Wordpad or Word, you can then click Edit, Find, and type in an email address, a name, a date, etc. and it will zap through the whole thing until it finds the first entry for your search....if it's not what you want, press the F3 key and it will look for the next instance of that search criteria. Eventually you will find the item you're looking for, but it will be done very rapidly, and you can copy/paste just the part you want to keep.
TONI
RE: Saving, burning, and restoring
by ding60 - 12/2/05 9:44 AM In reply to: Saving, burning, and restoring by TONI HThanks, Toni! I've learned something new, so today is good no matter what. Time to go home now....
Chris
by chuckieu - 12/2/05 11:04 AM In reply to: RE: Saving, burning, and restoring by ding60Like Toni said, once you have a saved email in the folder, you are burning correctly. It is getting a saved document that is the problem. Had the same problem. I
solved it by only using universal formats like jpeg (jpg), and HTML. While I use a safe email program (Thunderbird) instead of the hated OE, the solution works
for all I have run across. By using Html, I can open these files in Windows, Linux, and Mac.
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