Comcast to Road Runner -- using Mozilla Thunderbird

Are you a Comcast customer moving to Road Runner? Do you use Mozilla Thunderbird for your email? If so, here are some tips.

First, you do NOT go through the Activation Wizard process if you wish to use Thunderbird. Road Runner supports Outlook and Outlook Express so that is what it will look for and that is not what you need. Road Runner is actually already in place now as your Internet provider so you are already receiving the Internet through them instead of Comcast. So you do not need to make any changes regarding that.

To set up the Thunderbird email you go into your Thunderbird email and then just add one or more new accounts. Not hard and you will still have access to all your old email and address book. Your old accounts will still be included in the list of email accounts. You just change some settings and then you can delete all the duplicate mail that will show up. Road Runner has apparently been holding a duplicate copy of all the Comcast email in your new account until you retrieve it, so you have not missed anything -- but you will get duplicates dating from around Nov. 15 (or late Oct. in some cases).

Here are the steps:
Find your new Road Runner address. It is the same as your Comcast address except it has the ending @tx.rr.com

Open Thunderbird and set up a new account as follows.

Tools - Account Settings and choose the "Add Account" button at the lower left. Go through the process. Change the POP Mail Server name to
pop-server.tx.rr.com

On that same page you should uncheck the box that makes mail go into a Global Inbox to be stored in a local folder. Unchecking it will give your new email address a separate listing in your list of accounts. If you don't do that at this point you can reach the same menu from Server Settings - Advanced and check the button that says "Inbox for this server's account." However if you do it after you have restarted the email you will probably receive all your new mail under "Local" and then have to move it (but you can just drag it over).

At the Tools - Account Settings - Server Settings - Server Settings area add a check mark to the boxes that say "check for new messages at startup" and "automatically download new messages." Indicate how often to check for new messages and how long to leave messages on the server.

To finish you then go to
Tools - Account Settings, then look in the menu at the left and choose "Outgoing Server (SMTP)" which is at the very bottom of the list, even below "Local Folders." Choose "edit" and change the previous setting to smtp-server.tx.rr.com If you have multiple accounts you will probably only need to do this on the first account because it seems to carry over to the others.

Also go into the "Copies & Folders" section under your new account. Change the settings there so that copies and drafts of the messages you write in that account will go into a folder under your new account name.

To delete most of the duplicates that will come in, click on one message. Then move to one further along. Hold down the shift key and click again. It should highlight a long list of emails you can then delete with one stroke.

If something is not working right, look at one of the pre-existing accounts and examine its settings and make your new one match.

As far as style of writing, if you prefer that your reply type above the incoming text you can go to Composition & Addressing and make that choice under "Composition."

Be sure to alert your friends and family about your address change. Also, if you post to any listservs they will not recognize your new address, so you will need to make those changes. You will receive but probably not be able to post from your new account without updating. Comcast will continue to forward email for "one year" so I assume in October or Novemberof 2007 that will expire.

If you need help I recommend the online chat service available at http://help.rr.com It was speedy and resolved my question while I was still on hold on the telephone.

More details from their support for migrating customers
http://help.rr.com/HMSFaqs/e_migration.aspx
"Each customer receives 10 MB of storage space per e-mail account. If you have more then 10 MB of e-mail stored on the Road Runner server, you will receive a notification that you have exceeded the size limit. Any new e-mail sent to that account may be returned to the sender. Any messages that have been stored on the Road Runner server for more then 60 days will be automatically deleted. Check your e-mail setting to ensure that you are removing your incoming e-mail from our server and downloading the messages directly to your computer."

Once you are confident you are receiving your email and are still getting duplicates via the Comcast address you can go to Tools - Account Settings - Server Settings to change the settings on your Comcast address. Uncheck the boxes that instruct it to check for new messages and download them. Then they will no longer move onto your computer.

You can check your Road Runner email online at http://webmail.tx.rr.com/webedge