Convert Portable Thunderbird to Standard Version

I've been using Portable Thunderbird for email on my desktop and laptop computers for a few years.  It has allowed me to easily take all the work I've been doing on my desktop and copy it to a thumb drive to use with the laptop while travelling.  When I get home I just copy it all back onto the desktop and carry on.  (Actually I use the sync feature of Free Commander so that only the changed files get moved in either direction.)

For the past couple of years I've moved most of my mobile computing to my Android smartphone and Android tablet.  I rarely take my laptop on the road anymore.  So using Portable Thunderbird on my desktop no longer serves any useful purpose.  I plan to continue to use Thunderbird on the desktop but there is a drawback to using the portable version.  Windows will not allow it to be set as the default email client.  

So long as the portability was a major benefit I was able to live with the inconvenience of not having a default email client.  But now I want to convert to the standard version of Thunderbird so it can be my default email client.  It took a bit of digging to figure out how to do it but it turned out to be quite simple, if you know what to do.  If you are currently a Thunderbird user you already know most of what you need to know.  And you wouldn't be reading this if you weren't.  :-)

The first thing to know is that Thunderbird uses a profile(s) to store everything in: email account setup, folders and emails, address book(s), and settings related to all of that.

The second thing to know is that the standard version of Thunderbird can have multiple profiles, with one of them being the default, and Portable Thunderbird can only have one.

The third thing you need to know is how to make your Portable Thunderbird profile into your default profile in the standard version.

Step 1:

Download and install the standard version of Mozilla Thunderbird.

Step 2:

Run the newly installed Thunderbird once so it will create a default profile.

Step 3:

(Okay, now it's going to start getting tougher.)  Now you need to find and copy the Portable Thunderbird profile into the default profile in the newly installed standard version.

Finding your current profile

You can open your profile folder via "Help → Troubleshooting Information...".  When the Troubleshooting Information page is displayed look in the left column of the top section (Application Basics) for "Profile Folder". Now click on the "Show Folder button.

Clicking the "Show Folder" button will open a File Explorer window in the profile folder. This works for both the portable and standard versions of Thunderbird.

Step 4:

Now that you know how to get to the profile folders you need to open the standard version, go to the Troubleshooting Information screen and click the "Show Folder" button to open the default profile folder.  Close the standard version of Thunderbird but leave the File Explorer window open to the default profile folder.

Step 5:

Open the portable version and do the same thing to get a File Explorer window open in the portable version's profile folder. Close the portable version but leave the File Explorer window open.

Step 6:

Now that you have the two File Explorer windows open you just copy the contents of the Portable Thunderbird profile folder into the default profile folder for the standard version.  (You did pay attention to which folder was which, didn't you??)

Last Step:

Open the standard version of Mozilla Thunderbird and check to see that all the good stuff from the Portable version is now available.  

Y'er Welcome.  

Keywords: Move Portable Thunderbird profile to standard version of Thunderbird and make it the default.

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