# Fully retrieving my deactivated hotmail account -- HELP! **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 5, 2003, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fully-retrieving-my-deactivated-hotmail-account-help/173270 "2003-05-05T21:25:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![whatmove](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/ecc23a/32.png) [@whatmove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whatmove)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2003, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fully-retrieving-my-deactivated-hotmail-account-help/173270/1 "2003-05-05T21:25:12Z")
Hard to believe it’s been 30 days since I last checked my secondary Hotmail account. That’s the excuse they’re giving me for deactivating it. I can get my eddress back but I’m told that my messages and address book stored on the account are gone for good. Some of the lost info is very important and useful. Does anyone know how I can get it all back? Anyone have any connections that would come in handy? Please help me!!! -wm ---
**Author:** ![theretsof](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e8c25b/32.png) [@theretsof](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/theretsof)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2003, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fully-retrieving-my-deactivated-hotmail-account-help/173270/2 "2003-05-05T21:30:48Z")
Sorry, you’re SOL. Some say they do this to push their $20/yr Extended Service - you get 10mb instead of 2mb, and your Inbox won’t suddenly disappear. All of MSN is trying to make money now. Your info is lost forever. ---
**Author:** ![whatmove](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/ecc23a/32.png) [@whatmove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/whatmove)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2003, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fully-retrieving-my-deactivated-hotmail-account-help/173270/3 "2003-05-05T21:39:32Z")
I assume Google wouldn’t have cached any of it because it’s all password-protected, but is there any possibility I could find copies of the emails somewhere on my hard drive? -wm ---
**Author:** ![x-ray\_vision](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/x-ray_vision/32/351_2.png) [@x-ray\_vision](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/x-ray_vision)\ **Post date:** [May 5, 2003, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fully-retrieving-my-deactivated-hotmail-account-help/173270/4 "2003-05-05T22:03:51Z")
No, the e-mails are stored on thier computers for you to retrieve. They’re not sent to member’s computers. Sorry, they’re gone. ---
**Author:** ![Bill\_H](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a5b964/32.png) [@Bill\_H](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bill_H)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2003, 5:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fully-retrieving-my-deactivated-hotmail-account-help/173270/5 "2003-05-06T05:04:44Z")
A solution for next time, assuming you’re a unixhead: gotmail. gotmail will download from hotmail to your local machine. Typically you run it as a cron job and treat the download like any other email. ---
**Author:** ![Q.E.D](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/51bf81/32.png) [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2003, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fully-retrieving-my-deactivated-hotmail-account-help/173270/6 "2003-05-06T05:10:16Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by x-ray vision \* > \*\*No, the e-mails are stored on thier computers for you to retrieve. They’re not sent to member’s computers. Sorry, they’re gone. \*\* Strictly speaking, that’s not true. When you read a Hotmail message, the data is sent to your computer for viewing in your browser. It’s in your RAM when you look at it and have that browser page open, but once you close the browser (at least that particular instance of it), it’s gone. ---
**Author:** ![Bill\_H](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a5b964/32.png) [@Bill\_H](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bill_H)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2003, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fully-retrieving-my-deactivated-hotmail-account-help/173270/7 "2003-05-06T05:47:49Z")
and on that note, a lot of your recent stuff exists in your temp directories, but not everything. Dig around in c:\documents and settings\administrator\local settings emporary internet files (on Win2k, other Windows similar) ---
**Author:** ![Bill\_H](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a5b964/32.png) [@Bill\_H](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bill_H)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2003, 5:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fully-retrieving-my-deactivated-hotmail-account-help/173270/8 "2003-05-06T05:49:29Z")
Oh, duh. I forgot; you haven’t accessed the account in over 30 days. The odds of the above helping are slim at best. ---
**Author:** ![handy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5a626/32.png) [@handy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/handy)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2003, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fully-retrieving-my-deactivated-hotmail-account-help/173270/9 "2003-05-06T16:38:48Z")
Whats the purge rate now? Didn’t someone say 6 days for hotmail? ---
**Author:** ![shelbo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3d9bf3/32.png) [@shelbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shelbo)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2003, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fully-retrieving-my-deactivated-hotmail-account-help/173270/10 "2003-05-06T16:50:57Z")
If you’re worried about your copy of the “Rough Animal Sex With Re9al Girls” e-mail, I received three copies of it last week, and can forward them to your new hotmail account if you want. . .