Move your Personal Archives (.PST) to the Cloud on a PC

Take advantage of the 1TB mail storage and move your local PST archives to the cloud using the Outlook desktop app for Windows so you can access them from anywhere!

Quick Links: | About | Moving PSTs |

What are PSTs?

Note: This process involves file management that, if done incorrectly, could result in the loss of email. If you are uncertain of any of these steps please consult with ITSS.

In years past, PST archives were used to store email that a user wished to keep, but server space or organizational practices necessitated pulling mail off the server and into PST archives.
Some users also refer to PSTs as their "Personal Folders" or "Archive Folders."

Some major drawbacks to PSTs:

• They also have size limits.
• They are local to the machine - meaning you can not access mail in them remotely.
• They may become corrupted or lost for any number of reasons.
• Can be lost or damaged during system maintenance. 

The Benefit of Backing Up to the Cloud

With our new email system, users have 1TB (One Terabyte or 1000 Gigabytes!) of storage space. This is enough space to host your archives in the cloud so that you may access ALL your mail from wherever you are in the world. 

Moving Personal Archives (.PST) to the Cloud

1. Create a folder underneath the account username. Something like 'Archives' or 'PersonalFolders' is fine, although it does not necessarily matter what you call it.
   
    
2. Scroll down to the PST item and right-click its name.
3. Click 'Data File Properties' and then hit the 'Advanced' button. Make note of the path where the PST lives, then close Outlook.
4. Go to where the PST lives and copy+paste it to a flash drive for backup.
5. Open Outlook and scroll to the PST name and click "Close Data File"
6. Highlight the Folder you created in Step 1 (where the mail will be placed)
7. Navigate to File > Open & Export > Import/Export
8. Import from another program or file > Outlook Data File (.pst)  > Next
9. Browse to select the PST file > Select "Do Not Import Duplicates" > Next
10. The name of your PST will appear in the window. Be sure that "Include Subfolders" is checked and select "Import Items Into the Current Folder" > Next

This will take some time, but if all goes correctly, the mail will migrate to the folder you created and designated as the target. Then the PST will auto-close. Give it some time for all mail to populate. You have the backup on a flash drive to repeat the process should anything have gone wrong.

 Still need help? Contact IT Support Services for further assistance.
  
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