how to setup Outlook to NOT download old messages??

[Adrian Prasetya]

Hi There,

Need help with the following...

My Outlook data file is saved on my data drive, which is the D drive.
Because of something, I had to reformat my C drive. And after reinstalling
Windows, Office, etc. I went back to setup my Outlook to the data file on the
D drive. Naturally, all the old POP3 setup, folders, e-mail messages, and
even e-mail rules are imported.

BUT, when I clicked Send/Receive it redownloaded all the messages already in
the data file. How was that possible? Isn't Outlook supposed to read the
existing e-mail headers first and download only new e-mails? How do I
prevent Outlook from downloading old e-mails?

 

[Brian Tillman]

BUT, when I clicked Send/Receive it redownloaded all the messages
already in the data file. How was that possible? Isn't Outlook
supposed to read the existing e-mail headers first and download only
new e-mails?

That's not how POP clients work in determining what messages they're
downloaded and what they haven't. That information is kept in the mail
profile and because you reformatted, you had to create a new mail profile,
which reset everything.

How do I prevent Outlook from downloading old e-mails?

You have a couple of choices. First, you can create a new PST, make it your
delivery location, allow Outlook to download all your old mail, then switch
your delivery back to the current PST, dumping the new PST when you're done,
since it contains things you already have. Another approach would be to use
a web interface to connect to your mailbox on the ISP server, create another
folder there, and move all the messages from the server Inbox to the new
folder so that Outlook can't see it (POP doesn't support folders on the
server side). If it can't see it, it can't download it. You could also
just dump it from the server. Why keep a copy there if you never intend to
read it again?

 

[Tomar]

Hi, Are there any other ideas how to deal with this problem? The
suggestions mention above are not good in case when:
1. You have about 1.3 GB of messages
2. All messages are important - they are property of company I work -
so I can't delete them :-(

In my opinion there must be other solution how to solve this problem.
Does enybody knows it?

Thank you in advance
Tomek Konior

 

[Adrian Prasetya]

I think I get what you're saying about the mail profile. But I have similar
situation as Tomar's (see below), that one of my POP3 accounts is my office
mail, so I want to keep a copy of everything in the server.

Is there anything that can be done on the Outlook side?

Thank you.

 

[Brian Tillman]

Hi, Are there any other ideas how to deal with this problem? The
suggestions mention above are not good in case when:
1. You have about 1.3 GB of messages
2. All messages are important - they are property of company I work -
so I can't delete them :-(

In my opinion there must be other solution how to solve this problem.
Does enybody knows it?

At least one of the suggestions I made WILL work, WILL deal with as much
data as you like, WILL preserve the existing data, and will NOT require
downloading ANYTHING. Did you even read what I posted?

 

[Brian Tillman]

Is there anything that can be done on the Outlook side?

No. A new mail profile forces Outlook to download everything in the
server's inbox because, as far as Outlook is concerned, it's all new.