This tutorial focuses on those of you who use Outlook Express for email and how to back it up.

How do you know if you use Outlook Express?

The icon looks like this

There are 3 things you will need to back up in Outlook Express:

1. Messages
2. Address Book
3. Email account settings

To back up Outlook Express Messages:

You need to Copy Mail Files to a Backup Folder:
Open Outlook Express...
On the Tools menu, click Options.

On the Maintenance tab, click Store Folder.

Select the folder location, and then press Ctrl+C to copy the location. (remember the keyboard shortcuts last month?)

Click Cancel, and then click Cancel again to close the dialog box.

Click Start, and then click Run.

In the Open box, press Ctrl+V, and then click OK. (the folder with all the files in it should open)

Click once on any file and press Ctrl+A to Select All.

Now press Ctrl+C to Copy, and then close the window.

Right-click any empty space on your desktop, click New, and then click Folder.

Type mail backup for the folder name, and then press ENTER.

Double-click the mail backup folder to open it.

Click once in the empty space and press Ctrl+V to Paste all the files in.

Close the mail backup window.

That's your messages backed up

To back up the Outlook Express Address Book:

Click once on a space on the Desktop then press the F3 Key on your keyboard

In the Search window type *.wab

Look in C: Then click the Search button

This will take a while and find all the Windows Address Books (wab) on your computer

Select the file that looks the most recent and probably the largest size

Now press Ctrl+C to Copy, and then close the window.

Double-click the mail backup folder to open it.

Click once in the empty space and press Ctrl+V to Paste the address book file in

Close the mail backup window.

That's your Address Book backed up

To back up the Outlook Express Email Account Settings:

On the Tools menu, click Accounts.

On the Mail tab, click the mail account that you want to export, and then click Export.

In the Save In box, locate the mail backup folder on your desktop, and then click Save.

Repeat these steps for each mail account that you want to export.

Click Close

That's your Email Account Settings backed up

Get the Backup off your computer!

The whole point of backing up - is to keep a copy of your computer files away from the computer.  So do remember to finish by coppying the complete contents of the mail backup folder to a removable device (a disk, CDR or USB pen) and keep it in a seperate building to you computer - a thief or fire is not considerate!