How to save before reinstall

[GWats]

I'm about ready to reinstall Win98se. I've saved most everything I can think of but I'm not sure how to preserve my e-mail stuff. I use Outlook Express 6. I've copied the wab.exe file from the Outlook Express folder in Program Files. Will that work for the Address Book? I have no idea how to save all the old mail though (inbox, sent, etc.).
Any ideas?
Thanks

[shuchi_jain]

hi
have u checked your temporary internet folder?

[GWats]

There's thousands of files in there. What would I be looking for?

[Alvein]

For Outlook Express, your e-mail stuff could be either the address book or the mail folders (Inbox, etc.). I've not used Win98 for a long time, so I cannot tell you where exactly to look for, but this method will work for sure:

For address book, look for "*.wab" in your main drive. Backup that file, and write down the path, the way you know where to restore it later*. Just for reference, cause I use Win2K and the folders WILL differ, the address book file is at C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Application Data\Microsoft\Address Book.

For mail folders, look for "*.dbx". You should find some files like "Inbox.dbx", "Sent Items.dbx", etc. Back them up and remember the path*. After reinstall everything, you can restore them overwriting anything in that folder with safe. Again, just for reference, my mail folders lies in C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Local Settings\Application Data\Identities\{<SOME GUID>}\Microsoft\Outlook Express.

*At this point you have two choices: 1) after re-install Outlook Express, run it one time and then close it, the way the program creates/initializes its stuff, and then overwrite it; or 2) copy your saved data in a temp folder and run the File->Import tool inside Outlook Express. Any of them will do the job.

Hope this helps.

[GWats]

Thanks alot
The files were right there and I saved them to disk for later.
Thanks again!!