How can I MANUALLY move my mail to a Lion Machine???

emulatorloo · Post by **emulatorloo** » Sun Dec 09, 2012 11:11 am

In the past, I've been able to just copy the mail stuff from the appropriate folders in my old user directory into the right places on a new machine.

But when I do that to this Lion Machine, I don't seem to get all my mail. Seems like Apple has changed something in order to personally •••• with me.

Been searching the net but apparently everybody is all about Migration Assistant, I've got this Mac Pro 08 Lion box set up just the way I want it and really don't want to "start over" which is what Migration Assistant apparently requires.

Any thoughts would be appreciated - pretty sure a few of you have managed this w no problems.

billf · Post by **billf** » Sun Dec 09, 2012 12:28 pm

In the Mail application there is an option File > Import Mailboxes

What results do you get when you try that?

emulatorloo · Post by **emulatorloo** » Sun Jan 06, 2013 6:27 pm

Great idea! THANKS. Too bad I got too busy to get to it yet.

Frodo · Post by **Frodo** » Sun Jan 06, 2013 9:21 pm

E-LOO!!

MIDI Life Crisis · Post by **MIDI Life Crisis** » Sun Jan 06, 2013 9:23 pm

Yeah. Nice to see him around here again.

FutureLegends · Post by **FutureLegends** » Mon Jan 07, 2013 7:09 am

If you use IMAP accounts they should be synced automatically.
I remember having to go through all that when using POP accounts before switching to IMAP.

emulatorloo · Post by **emulatorloo** » Tue Feb 26, 2013 2:42 pm

POP unfortunately. Still dilly-dallying around with this. Think probably need to do a time machine back up on my Lion mac and then start trying stuff.

Phil O · Post by **Phil O** » Wed Feb 27, 2013 7:20 am

I seem to remember going through this when I got my laptop. I'm pretty sure Bill's method is what I used. I know I didn't use migration asst. I think I booted my tower in firewire target mode and hooked the laptop to it, then went to mail/import. Somethin like that.

Phil

FutureLegends · Post by **FutureLegends** » Wed Feb 27, 2013 2:07 pm

My suggestion: Find some way to archive your old POP mail, and start anew with IMAP on the new install/machine.

mikehalloran · Post by **mikehalloran** » Wed Feb 27, 2013 2:29 pm

If the mail was stored on your old Mac, Migration Assistant is the way you put it on the new one.

If you never deleted anything from your POP or IMAP server, it will all show up again once you re-connect. Eventually... depending on how much you have on the servers and the speed of your internet connection.

emulatorloo · Post by **emulatorloo** » Thu Feb 28, 2013 3:22 pm

Thanks, gentlemen. You have given me many ideas.

Migration Assistant doesn't want to move the old G4 Cube mail into an already existing acct.

I think what I am going to do is clean up my Mac Pro boot drive and do a time machine back-up.

Then I will try to import the mailboxes and see how that works.

If I don't like the results, will change things back with the time machine back-up.

Then I will format an external drive and put Lion on it. When the machine reboots from that drive, and asks if I want to use migration assistant, will say hell yeah and bring over the mail from the G4 cube.

Then I will open Lion mail and let it do whatever it does to make my mail all Lion-y.

Then I will try to manually copy the mail directory from that external drive into the right place on my Mac Pro boot drive.

Sounds nuts I know.

mikehalloran · Post by **mikehalloran** » Thu Feb 28, 2013 5:16 pm

Migration Assistant doesn't want to move the old G4 Cube mail into an already existing acct.

Of course not - that's not how it works. It moves the application and all related files which it will open up in the new mail client.

Then I will try to manually copy the mail directory from that external drive into the right place on my Mac Pro boot drive.

Good luck with that. The Mail client has changed a few times since any OS that ran on the Cube.

emulatorloo · Post by **emulatorloo** » Fri Mar 01, 2013 2:32 pm

mikehalloran wrote:
Then I will try to manually copy the mail directory from that external drive into the right place on my Mac Pro boot drive.
Good luck with that. The Mail client has changed a few times since any OS that ran on the Cube.

Well, believe it or not, that worked PERFECTLY!

To reiterate what I did:

- attached Firewire disk named "New Lion" to Mac Pro
- also had Cube attached on the firewire bus in target mode
- Ran Lion installer and installed on "New Lion"
- When done, Mac Pro booted from "New Lion"
- was asked if I wanted to migrate stuff from an old mac
- Said yes and pointed to the Cube's HD
- just said I wanted user data
- once the data import was done, I arrived at the desktop
- I opened the Mail app, and it updated my mail files to Lion Mail format
- and there everything was!

Then I made the user library on "New Lion" visible, and I copied the "mail" and "mail downloads" directory into my user library on my internal boot drive. Also copied all mail related pref files from "New Lion".

Rebooted from internal boot drive, opened the Mail app, and there you have it! Success!

Really appreciate everybody's help - Mike, I think you gave me this kooky idea.

MOTUnation.com

How can I MANUALLY move my mail to a Lion Machine???

How can I MANUALLY move my mail to a Lion Machine???

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Re: How can I MANUALLY move my mail to a Lion Machine???

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