# Windows Live Hotmail & Thunderbird :-(

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-live-hotmail-thunderbird/415927>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [August 17, 2007, 12:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-live-hotmail-thunderbird/415927 "2007-08-17T12:49:21Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![NoCoolUserName](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/5fc32e/32.png) [@NoCoolUserName](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NoCoolUserName)\
**Post date:** [August 17, 2007, 12:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-live-hotmail-thunderbird/415927/1 "2007-08-17T12:49:21Z")

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Thunderbird can no longer retrieve my mail from Hotmail. It worked a few days ago, and then I got automatically upgraded to Windows Live and now it doesn’t. I suspect the two events are related.

Anyone know why?

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**Author:** ![si\_blakely](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d9b06d/32.png) [@si\_blakely](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/si_blakely)\
**Post date:** [August 17, 2007, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-live-hotmail-thunderbird/415927/2 "2007-08-17T14:18:12Z")

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Hotmail does not provide internet standard IMAP/POP access to mailboxes - it is web only (to make you look at the ads). You must be using a webscraper extension - which reads the web pages and parses the info out of Hotmail into Thunderbird (I use a similar tool for my email server). These webscrapers are sensitive to the page layout. A small change at the MS end can break the tool. And MS seem to be making a lot of changes at present.

So the tools are broken until they are updated for Live. ☹

You need a new Live Mail extension.

Si

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**Author:** ![Wakinyan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wakinyan/32/352_2.png) [@Wakinyan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wakinyan)\
**Post date:** [August 17, 2007, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-live-hotmail-thunderbird/415927/3 "2007-08-17T15:00:06Z")

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I get my messages from one of three Hotmail accounts; the other two asks for password, and then tells me: “Negative vibes from [Hotmail address].” It has always been this way. I googled a lot, but still don’t know why. It’s a pity.

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**Author:** ![GiantRat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@GiantRat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GiantRat)\
**Post date:** [August 17, 2007, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/windows-live-hotmail-thunderbird/415927/4 "2007-08-17T23:21:53Z")

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[QUOTE=Wakinyan]  
I get my messages from one of three Hotmail accounts; the other two asks for password, and then tells me: “Negative vibes from [Hotmail address].” It has always been this way. I googled a lot, but still don’t know why. It’s a pity.  
[/QUOTE]

I’ve found improved performance by switching the Hotmail plugin to WebDAV mode.