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Somebody please poke a hole in my crazy idea if there is a hole...

My folks have an old podunk email account from their ISP. They don't want to migrate to Gmail, but I would like to at least somehow back up their emails. My idea is to configure GMail to receive their email via pop3 from their ISP, and then configure Thunderbird to receive their email via pop3 from GMail. Will this work? Or are there any better suggestions out there? It has to be easy. The reason I was going this route is because it would be transparent to them.

Thanks!

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This question would be more appropriate for the WebApps Stack Exchange site. It is off-topic for SuperUser, as the FAQ states that SuperUser is not for webapps or online services. – nhinkle♦ Sep 20 '10 at 6:07
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closed as off topic by nhinkle♦, Diago Sep 20 '10 at 8:36

Questions on Super User are expected to generally relate to computer software or computer hardware, within the scope defined in the faq.

3 Answers

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My idea is to configure GMail to receive their email via pop3 from their ISP, and then configure Thunderbird to receive their email via pop3 from GMail. Will this work?

This will work for newer incoming mails. Hope you have a backup of the existing mails.

And check that the below setting has a checkmark against it.

gmail

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I actually set up a gmail account, connected via imap, and moved all their existing email there. I just reconfigured it to use pop3 and it's pulling it all back down again. Their connection is slow, so I was second-guessing my idea while waiting. – Mike C. Sep 20 '10 at 3:32
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Is there any reason you can't just use thunderbird or outlook and configure them for POP3 for the ISP account? Just make sure to leave messages on server and it will pull everything that is currently on the server. Both of those programs include archiving capability which will allow you to back the mail up easily.

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Many ISPs will allow you to set up auto-forwarding on the account. You should contact them and ask if you can auto-forward a copy to gmail.

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