Migrating but Concerned about e-mail

[dmunz]

I am probably going to make the move from a home-built pc to a mac mini. I plan on going "cold turkey' to OSX and I've figured out just about everything that may be an issue except e-mail.

I have a very old email account connecting with Outlook and my wife uses Windows live mail.

I have probably 15 years of e-mail in my PST file that I do not want to loose. I will probably buy Office for Mac. So my questions are:

1. Will the Mac version of Outlook be able to read the PST file? (I will be on an external NTFS drive.)

2. What would the migration strategy be? (ie, load Office for Mac and then... or start with migration.)

3. How do I preserve my wife's Live Mail account and what how will she access it after the conversion?

TIA
DLM

 

[hallux]

The PST file can be imported into Outlook on a Mac, it gets converted into an OLM (the Mac version) but once that's done the PST is pushed aside and never touched again. Going back to a Windows PC will be VERY difficult as the Windows Outlook won't read OLM and Mac Outlook doesn't utilize the PST as it was.

You can migrate in any order (move files then install Office, or the other way).

I have no experience with WLM but Apple mail or Outlook should be able to connect to the service.

 

[monkeybagel]

The PST file can be imported into Outlook on a Mac, it gets converted into an OLM (the Mac version) but once that's done the PST is pushed aside and never touched again. Going back to a Windows PC will be VERY difficult as the Windows Outlook won't read OLM and Mac Outlook doesn't utilize the PST as it was.

You can migrate in any order (move files then install Office, or the other way).

I have no experience with WLM but Apple mail or Outlook should be able to connect to the service.

Also to add - I have not tried this, but I know that on Outlook for Windows, it requires read-write access to the PST file to open it. Since the Macintosh cannot write to an NTFS partition, you should probably make a copy of the PST to the Macintosh, and them import from there.

Not sure how many messages you have, but Outlook for Macintosh has different characteristics in regards to the way it handles mail. Are you running against an Exchange Server by chance? If you have several gigabytes of messages, it may not perform as well as it's Windows counterpart. You will just have to try it and see. It's not "buggy" per-se but can be a little slower depending on your mailbox size. Still should be very usable, though.

 

[hallux]

Also to add - I have not tried this, but I know that on Outlook for Windows, it requires read-write access to the PST file to open it. Since the Macintosh cannot write to an NTFS partition, you should probably make a copy of the PST to the Macintosh, and them import from there.

Not sure how many messages you have, but Outlook for Macintosh has different characteristics in regards to the way it handles mail. Are you running against an Exchange Server by chance? If you have several gigabytes of messages, it may not perform as well as it's Windows counterpart. You will just have to try it and see. It's not "buggy" per-se but can be a little slower depending on your mailbox size. Still should be very usable, though.

Emphasis mine.

Pretty much a given. However, Outlook for Mac won't actually write to the PST (it can't), all it will do is to open it to read and import the data into an OLM (which is where the writing actually takes place). I support and use Outlook for Mac at work. If copying the data over a network connection, the SMB connection to the Windows computer will allow read/write access to the drive anyway.

 

[monkeybagel]

Emphasis mine.

Pretty much a given. However, Outlook for Mac won't actually write to the PST (it can't), all it will do is to open it to read and import the data into an OLM (which is where the writing actually takes place). I support and use Outlook for Mac at work. If copying the data over a network connection, the SMB connection to the Windows computer will allow read/write access to the drive anyway.

I think the OP mentioned it would be copied from an external NTFS drive.