MS Outlook - 1 PC dual boot - one place for all emails?

PC Hobbyist

PC Hobbyist

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I have XP Pro set up to dual boot on my pc. Basically, I recently installed xp again, but on another partition so that I could start "clean" again. In this new partition I plan on only installing the essentials. I will use the old xp partition to mess around with programs that I only use once in a blue moon or trial software etc...

Well, I would like to install MS Outlook on my new xp partition. Is it possible to use the outlook.pst file belonging to the old xp partition (i.e. use that actual file path - not a copy of the file) so that no matter if I go back an forth on booting to the different partitions, all my emails will always be there when I open outlook regardless of what partition I happen to boot to?

It would just be annoying to have some emails in one partition and then the next day boot to the other partition and have the new emails for that day saved in that partition only. You get my point?
 
When you setup on the IE and Outlook Express on the second installation the presently on the mail server will come automatically even if you delete it from the first Outlook inbox. Once it's read or deleted on the mail server it won't come in on either. If you go online to your account at the ISP's start page you can log in there at anytime regardless of XP installation you boot with. It's still the same account.

The only thing that will effect that is if you have the maintainance options set to delete mail from the server when deleted from OE. When you later boot from the other it would be gone having been deleted from the server by the other one. You simply set up IE and OE the same way for each Windows installation for ready access.
 
PC eye said:
When you setup on the IE and Outlook Express.....
Click to expand...

Hi PC eye,
You probably over saw this, but I'm actually referring to MS Outlook and not Outlook Express. :) My question is about using the path to the outlook.pst file of the first xp installation - as the .pst file to be used in the second xp installation. So, basically regardless of which xp I boot to, the same identical .pst file will be accessed by MS Outlook and I would always have all of my emails.

Would that work? I don't see why not, but I wanted to check first.
 
Should wok - In Outlook you need to go to Tools/options/mail setup/ and click on the data files tab - you will see the path where Outlook automatically saves the ,pst file to. Change it to the one on the partition with your previous installation. Whichever instance oif Outlook you now open should refer to the same file.
 
you just have to import your pst file is all. I have done this numerous times in the past for people who never backed up their email.

You can actually set the path to where the pst file is saved, and I typically like to toss it in the \users\my documents directory over the documents and settings that way its right there in the my documents. However, I haven't used outlook in ages (we run groupwise at my work) so I can't say that I remember how to do that.
 
You can have both copies of MS Outlook point to the same .pst file. The only problem there is that you obviously cannot have both copies accessing the file simultaneously. One copy has to go away for the other copy to access the file. I have done this for one customer over a local network because they wanted all of their emails present when they accessed Outlook. It works great.

Set the path in the second email through File Data Management to the .pst file in question.
 
don't over write the file though, just import the pst file, in fact copy/paste it to your new partition that way if you screw anything up you still have a good back up. Changing the path where the file is saved may actually over write the old file.
 
There is no possibility of overwriting the file. You will end up with two programs reading (and writing) to the same file. That way all correspondence coming and going is recorded. I read the original post as desiring that fact. What the original poster should do as well is download pfbackup from Microsoft. This will give him an option to backup the .pst file.
 
PC Hobbyist said:
Hi PC eye,
You probably over saw this, but I'm actually referring to MS Outlook and not Outlook Express. :) My question is about using the path to the outlook.pst file of the first xp installation - as the .pst file to be used in the second xp installation. So, basically regardless of which xp I boot to, the same identical .pst file will be accessed by MS Outlook and I would always have all of my emails.

Would that work? I don't see why not, but I wanted to check first.
Click to expand...

XP comes with Outlook Express by default. When getting it setup the mail remaining on the ISP's mail server will come into the Outlook automatically as explained earlier unless you went online to access your mail there first. When running 3 different versions of Windows on 3 different drives here I never worry about "missed" mail since as I connect with a new install of IE and OE it comes flooding in!

As long as you haven't deleted the mail seen on the mail server you can always move it to folders there like drafts or sent mail. No matter if it's Home or Pro or Vista or Linux when I get online there the mail saved in online folders is still found. Manually copying the pst file from one partition to the other can also work. But when you first load one version and see mail come in you can also reboot to the other to open Outlook and see it come in there as well.
 
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