[How-to] Switch COMPLETELY from Gmail to Outlook/Live.com

[msstax]

i would love to switch from gmail to outlook.com but until Microsoft gets rid of the "sent on behalf of XXX" and adds the ability to put a different name on the e mails, i have to reluctantly use gmail.... my microsoft account user name is my work e mail but i use my personal e mail to send from and all e mails sent from live.com or windows phone will say sent on behalf of "my work email account.. hotmail, etc"... not very professional and on my personal e mail i don't want my work e mail to show up... if i change my microsoft account to my personal e mail, then all my windows phone settings, xbox live, etc gets wiped and i start all over.... any suggestions?

 

[MikeTheYid]

One other bit not included in that tutorial I wish to add is if you happen to have an Xbox with an Xbox Live account. When you first set up your console and create a "Windows Live ID", you may have created an ID and subsequent Gamertag that is associated with another email address from a different provider, which the Windows Live ID system allows you to do. If you are someone who is fully throwing in your lot with Microsoft, doing all the stuff in Jakeeeee's tutorial and wish to change your Gamertag and Xbox Live account over as well, here's what you must do:

By doing that will I bet transferring purchase history for Windows Phone also?

I don't mind setting up my phone completely again but need to keep all my paid for apps.

 

[a5cent]

i would love to switch from gmail to outlook.com but until Microsoft gets rid of the "sent on behalf of XXX" and adds the ability to put a different name on the e mails, i have to reluctantly use gmail.... my microsoft account user name is my work e mail but i use my personal e mail to send from and all e mails sent from live.com or windows phone will say sent on behalf of "my work email account.. hotmail, etc"... not very professional and on my personal e mail i don't want my work e mail to show up... if i change my microsoft account to my personal e mail, then all my windows phone settings, xbox live, etc gets wiped and i start all over.... any suggestions?

You don't loose your xbox live avatar or achievements.
WP8 includes a backup app that can save most of your settings to skydrive and later restore them.
You might loose your progress in games, but it depends on the game.

Regarding your issue with outlook.com, maybe this can help you.

 

[BitPusher2600]

By doing that will I bet transferring purchase history for Windows Phone also?

I don't mind setting up my phone completely again but need to keep all my paid for apps.

Man you've asked a difficult question there and the answer is YES.
I say difficult because I can't walk you thru it, I don't know how I did it because it took alot of digging around in settings menus and stuff to get this to work. Look here,
I first got my Windows Live account when I got my first Xbox, which was the black "Elite" when it came out. At that time, my Windows Live ID was an @gmail address. Despite searching alot fairly recently for articles on how to switch one Live ID to another, I couldn't find a way to do it and keep EVERYTHING (as in both Phone purchases AND all the Xbox stuff like my Gamertag and accompanying achievements.) Instead, I did find a way to do it myself.

I went to live.com and created a spanking new account with an @live.com email address. The next part that I can't remember is if it's the old ID or new one I logged in to and played with the options until I found a way to give the old account the new log in, and that results in a complete account shift. It is NOT adding an alias. Once this was all said and done I did have to reset my phone and re-download my apps, no big deal really. At any rate, I apologize that I can't be of more use, but it's going to take a little of your time to just play with the options and settings in your accounts. Like I said, I successfully transfered all account related 'everything' to the new login which is the new @live address I created and there's not a trace of the previous gmail involvement anywhere, because it was somewhere in the settings that the login ID is where you make the change.

Good luck man.

 

[ScubaDog]

I can't stress enough, though, that you really SHOULD establish your Microsoft account under the outlook.com domain if you plan to use Windows 8. I've been with Windows 8 since the Developer Preview. Originally, I had a Hotmail account BUT I used my own domain as the actually account name. I own my own servers, so I didn't want to have a bunch of email addresses. I discovered through the Developer Preview, Consumer Preview, Release Preview AND the final version of Windows 8 that Microsoft simply does NOT handle a simple POP3 domain address very well at all when it's used as the Microsoft account. Even after choosing the upgrade option to move my Hotmail account to Outlook account (which changed nothing as far as my email address and account info). Windows 8 just didn't like it very well (intermittent emails). So, I bit the bullet and logged into Outlook.com and RENAMED my account. This allowed me to choose a new address in the Outlook.com domain but keep everything that my account had IN it (contacts, email, SkyDrive, etc.). I simply made sure I added back in my original domain email address and changed it to my default in the Outlook.com settings. Of course, I DID have to hard reset my Windows Phone to use the new Outlook.com address as the login. Similarly, I had to now log into my Windows 8 devices and Zune and Xbox to use the new domain, but all my purchases, etc., flowed right along with me. I lost nothing, other than having to jump into windowsphone.com and go back over my purchase history and check the boxes for all the items I wanted to reinstall. Everything moves very solidly now, regardless of my device.

 

[the_coolestnerd]

"I can't stress enough, though, that you really SHOULD establish your Microsoft account under the outlook.com domain if you plan to use Windows 8. I've been with Windows 8 since the Developer Preview. Originally, I had a Hotmail account BUT I used my own domain as the actually account name. I own my own servers, so I didn't want to have a bunch of email addresses. I discovered through the Developer Preview, Consumer Preview, Release Preview AND the final version of Windows 8 that Microsoft simply does NOT handle a simple POP3 domain address very well at all when it's used as the Microsoft account. Even after choosing the upgrade option to move my Hotmail account to Outlook account (which changed nothing as far as my email address and account info). Windows 8 just didn't like it very well (intermittent emails). So, I bit the bullet and logged into Outlook.com and RENAMED my account. This allowed me to choose a new address in the Outlook.com domain but keep everything that my account had IN it (contacts, email, SkyDrive, etc.). I simply made sure I added back in my original domain email address and changed it to my default in the Outlook.com settings. Of course, I DID have to hard reset my Windows Phone to use the new Outlook.com address as the login. Similarly, I had to now log into my Windows 8 devices and Zune and Xbox to use the new domain, but all my purchases, etc., flowed right along with me. I lost nothing, other than having to jump into windowsphone.com and go back over my purchase history and check the boxes for all the items I wanted to reinstall. Everything moves very solidly now, regardless of my device."


My question for you is how did you rename your account? Right now I log onto my Microsoft account with my @gmail address...I just to keep my current account but use @outlook as my log in

 

[irvin792]

Its not allowing me to rename mine :|

 

[doomtuba]

Thanks a ton for this! I'm sure I could have figured this out eventually, but this nice little guide made it that much quicker and easier! I am not weaned off of Google save for YouTube and my Nexus 7 until a 7" RT tablet gets released :grin:

 

[nohorse]

I also wanted to grab all my old gmail mail messages from 2004 to today. I'm using a combination of send-and-receive account to slowly get all the old messages and forwarding from gmail to get the new messages. I've had to check on the account a few times and kick it to restart. I also ran into an issue where the contacts would fail to import into outlook after exported from gmail. No detail in the error. I got around that by using outlook desktop application to import the gmail csv w/o issue and then re-exporting to be imported to outlook.com

 

[irvin792]

from the outlook.com help forums


Mary Grace A. replied on December 15, 2012

Forum Moderator
In reply to WilliamSDR post on December 14, 2012



Hi,

Please be advised that rename feature is currently not available. The Engineering team is aware of the problem and working to fix it. At this time, we don?t have a date when the feature will be restored. Thank you for your patience.

Thanks.




Fantastic, Ill be renaming mine as soon as its back up

 

[axol]

Would love do the switch, but Microsoft are making it so hard for Mac users - Outlook.com just does not work on Safari or Chrome on a Mac. Apparently they're aware of the issue and working on a fix (lots of questions in MS forums), but it's been like this since launch... Love or hate Google, at least their web properties work reliably across platforms.

 

[brmiller1976]

Just download Firefox. Or run Windows on your Mac.

 

[Dr. Impossible]

Trying to set up my mail, just the mail, and this is incredibly frustrating. Is there any way anyone can add more to detail to the OP? Everytime I get to 'Add send and recieve account' I type in my password etc. for gmail and it doesn't import, telling me I need to go into gmail settings and change my POP dowload settings, which I do, click save. Ain't happening. Any help would be great.

Thanks
-Doc

 

[mister2d]

Would love do the switch, but Microsoft are making it so hard for Mac users - Outlook.com just does not work on Safari or Chrome on a Mac. Apparently they're aware of the issue and working on a fix (lots of questions in MS forums), but it's been like this since launch... Love or hate Google, at least their web properties work reliably across platforms.

What doesn't work? I'm using Safari right now on Outlook.com. Followed the posted instructions too and everything worked for me.

 

[kyt#WP]

Is anyone else getting this error?

"You're currently signed in with an Office 365 email account, which can't be used with Outlook.com. Please click here to sign out of your Office 365 account, then use another Microsoft account to sign in to Outlook.com (for example, your hotmail.com, live.com, or msn.com account)."

 

[Habibul_Habibullah]

duh!

 

[tauruz]

Or you just use TrueSwitch: https://secure5.trueswitch.com/hotmail/

 

[the_coolestnerd]

I tried the Xbox method but it wouldn't let me switch any other ideas?

 

[Coan]

I don't recall seeing anyone mention it, but as a google apps user who wanted to use a live domain (and had to switch over my mx record) and keep the same email address, it doesn't look like trueswitch would allow that or the steps in listed.
However, you can set up the live domain, download your email into outlook express/windows mail/live mail and upload using an IE addon outlook.com provides (more mail settings, your email accounts, add a send and receive account, upload an email account).

Given google doesn't use folders it'll download EVERYTHING as one jumbled mess, but, its a method that will allow one to get all your emails copied over as long as you can log into both accounts at all.

Edit: seems you may need to trick the uploader by changing the account info in windows live mail to another email address if you're using the same email address (such as a switching from google apps to live domains) and then fixing the information in the edit server info option. It seems to be uploading the email ok, though it sent the linking email to the dummy email account i used.

 

[tacofiend]

Alright, so currently I'm using a Gmail address as my Microsoft account ID. I would really like to avoid changing my address as I have a lot of things tied to it, but even after importing my contacts it doesn't give me the option in WP8 to sync contacts with this account. Am I going to be forced to create a new Outlook account and sync contacts to there instead?