How can I move Outlook 2003 from one user account to another on the same computer?

June 16, 2008 7:33 AM

How can I migrate my Outlook 2003 settings, mail, contacts and calendars to a new XP user account on the same computer?

I've taken over the computer and email address of my predecessor but they set me up with a new local user account in XP. How can I get my predecessor's Outlook to open under my user account? I've seen details on how to move Outlook to a new computer but that takes something like 40 steps! There's got to be an easier way given that I'm staying on the same computer and have full run of the hard drive. I also have access to the old user account and admin privileges if that makes a difference.

posted by JPDD to computers & internet (6 comments total)

You should ask your administrator to give you rights to his mailbox and add his mailbox as secondary mailbox in your own outlook. This assumes you have exchange running.

If you are not running exchange then get his username and password and server settings and create a secondary account.

I guess what you are looking for is some way to just copy his profile. I believe you should be able to copy the outlook folder from local settings and overwrite your own, but that might not work out as you think it will. It will over-write your own outlook settings. This is probably the '40 step' process you mention. I dont recommend this. The proper approach is get reset his password and download his mail. A full on copy like this can lead to corruption and other issues. I'd talk to the person who setup your own email.
posted by damn dirty ape at 8:20 AM on June 16

Yep, you can copy the old profile to your new profile. this will import the outlook settings. this will screw up anything you have already done to your account to make it your own though.

otherwise you could just set up outlook and import the old .pst file(s) from the previous person. this would get you their old email stuff, calendar and anything else they kept in the .pst, and let you use the account.

OUtlook can also handle multiple accounts. so you could set this up as a second account.
posted by Amby72 at 9:43 AM on June 16

Actually I don't have anything I'd mind losing in my own profile so overwriting it with my predecessor's profile wouldn't be a problem. So it's just a matter of copying the outlook folder from the old documents and settings?
posted by JPDD at 11:27 AM on June 16

Yep, its this folder:

C:\Documents and Settings\username\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook

Depending on the authentication method it might or might not cache the password.
posted by damn dirty ape at 11:35 AM on June 16

there might also be some permission issues, so you would need to give yourself ownership to those files. this would need to be done as an administrator.
posted by Amby72 at 11:43 AM on June 16

Hmm.... I just tried copying the folder over and the old mail is there but it doesn't seem to have done anything about setting up my accounts, is this something that needs to be done manually?
posted by JPDD at 12:03 PM on June 16