I bought an Imac 3 days ago and to begin with Mail opened fine. Now it will not open and instead when I click on Mail I get "Welcome to mail" message and it tells me I have to import message, once I click to import "preparing to import message" appears which goes on forever and nothing happens.
Shortly after setting Imac up there was a new software upgrade which I downloaded and I think it's since then MAIL hasn't worked.
Has anyone had a similar problem and how did you resolve.
Thank in advance for all suggestions.
iMac,
Mac OS X (10.6.4),
Macbook Pro iphone4 Airport Express Apple TV
(1) remove the Mail caches from your user Library folder ~/Library/Caches/com.apple.mail
(2) reapply the latest combo updater 10.6.4, you can download it from Apple downloads page
(3) from your user Library folder drag the file Envelope Index to the desktop, that would be ~/Library/Mail/Envelope Index
(4) if that didn't fix the issue, drag the preference file of mail from ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.mail.plist to the desktop and sees if that help
If that didn't work, most probably you are having a problem with a certain email message.
(1) Create a new fresh user account
(2) go to your existing user folder ~/Library/ and copy the Mail & Mail Downloads folders as they are to an external hard drive or flash memory
(3) Login with the new created user account with your external media still plugged in and copy the Mail and Mail Downloads folders to the new user's Library folder
(4) Open Mail application and sees if it will be able to import and open normally
(5) If the same issue occurred in the new created user account, then we will be sure that there is a certain message and/or attachment and/or account causing the issue.
(6) At this stage, you should go back to your original existing user account, delete the created user account as it's job would be done. And start the elimination method, first move the Mail Downloads folder out of your Library folder and sees if this helps, if not, put it back and move the POP or IMAP account folder outside your Mail folder that should be named like POP-mumboitaliano@yourdomain.com and start Mail again and see if it will work
(7) If it did work at that stage, then something (most probably a message) in this account is corrupted, and you could start a deeper elimination technique by putting it back but not as it is, you should put the account standard mailboxes like Inbox.mbox, Sent Messages.mbox...etc one by one, further you should dive deep inside each POP mbox folder and go to the Messages folders that store your messages individually in the emlx format and copy them as groups or individually depending on how much messages you have.
(1) remove the Mail caches from your user Library folder ~/Library/Caches/com.apple.mail
(2) reapply the latest combo updater 10.6.4, you can download it from Apple downloads page
(3) from your user Library folder drag the file Envelope Index to the desktop, that would be ~/Library/Mail/Envelope Index
(4) if that didn't fix the issue, drag the preference file of mail from ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.mail.plist to the desktop and sees if that help
If that didn't work, most probably you are having a problem with a certain email message.
(1) Create a new fresh user account
(2) go to your existing user folder ~/Library/ and copy the Mail & Mail Downloads folders as they are to an external hard drive or flash memory
(3) Login with the new created user account with your external media still plugged in and copy the Mail and Mail Downloads folders to the new user's Library folder
(4) Open Mail application and sees if it will be able to import and open normally
(5) If the same issue occurred in the new created user account, then we will be sure that there is a certain message and/or attachment and/or account causing the issue.
(6) At this stage, you should go back to your original existing user account, delete the created user account as it's job would be done. And start the elimination method, first move the Mail Downloads folder out of your Library folder and sees if this helps, if not, put it back and move the POP or IMAP account folder outside your Mail folder that should be named like POP-mumboitaliano@yourdomain.com and start Mail again and see if it will work
(7) If it did work at that stage, then something (most probably a message) in this account is corrupted, and you could start a deeper elimination technique by putting it back but not as it is, you should put the account standard mailboxes like Inbox.mbox, Sent Messages.mbox...etc one by one, further you should dive deep inside each POP mbox folder and go to the Messages folders that store your messages individually in the emlx format and copy them as groups or individually depending on how much messages you have.
Thank you so much for you lengthy response to my problem.
I did (1) and then (2). But once i'd downloaded the latest combo updater and came to the installation i get the following message:
"Mac OS X Server Update combined can't be installed on this disk. This volume does not meet the requirements for this update"........Does that mean I don't need it or is something else wrong?
Regarding it possibly being a problem with a certain message, I don't think it could be because I had set it up on day one and contacts were imported from my external hard drive as were other files and the office suite. But later on I deleted all contact in address book as I wanted to import a different updated set of contacts, it was after this deletion from the address book that Mail didn't work anymore. Don't know if that could be related or not!?
I just tried your suggestion no. (4) and my mail is back and working!!!
Just wondering what should I now do with the 2 files that i now have sitting on my desktop, (com.apple.mail.plist and the com.apple.mail)? Can these be trashed??
Yes trash them safely, com.apple.mail folder is a cache that had been already generated and re-created by Mail and com.apple.mail.plist is the preference (settings) file which you probably didn't change yet and also it have been re-created in he same place.
