Upgrading Office Outlook from 2007

[TwoTankAmin]

I have an unusual situation. I have Office 2007 and only use Word and Outlook. I need to change email providers and want to use Proton. They allow the use of email programs like Outlook, but they say they support 2010 and up but not down. I have Windows 7 64 bit. As an FYI, I have had updates for Other Microsoft products turned off for several years and it will not turn back on.

I need to update Outlook if I want to use it with Proton. Is there any way to update Outlook only? If not what is the best way to get where I need? Do I have to replace all of Office 2007 with 2010?

I am moving to Proton paid version because AOL wants my consent to read my emails or they will terminate my service. I have two words for AOl, and by definition Verizon who owns them, and they are not happy Birthday. However, I do not wish to allow Microsoft to read my emails either. My biggest concern is that I do not lose all my settings and emails on my box as a result of trying to move up to Outlook 2010. I also do not want to lose my Word files of I have to update to full office 2010. Would A higher version of office that doesn't try to send me ads or use the cloud a possibility.

And suggestions? Thanks in advance.

p.s. As soon as i get email done I am hooking up a VPN to send Verizon the middle finger they deserve.

Edit: I can buy Office 2016 and get the DVD for $55 online. I am worried however, that I will not get any updates due to my current setting in Updates which will not work to change it back to get updates for other Microsoft products.

[mr tribute]

Why not Thunderbird, SeaMonkey, FossaMail or something else less evil than MS Office?

https://www.reddit.com/r/privacytoolsIO ... _imapsmtp/

I'm sure MS Office 2016 is full of spyware (no joke). Encryption is no good if your software has a key-logger built in.

[TwoTankAmin]

Here is what Proton says about the Bridge which is the app needed for Proton email to work with email programs.

On macOS, we have tested the Bridge on Apple Mail, Thunderbird, and Outlook 2011/2016. On Windows, we have tested the Bridge on Thunderbird and Outlook 2010/2013/2016. Every client implements the IMAP standard slightly differently, so we cannot make any guarantees about how the Bridge will behave on clients other than the ones listed.

from https://protonmail.com/bridge/faq

I have used Outlook Express and then Outlook since day one of using email. I have no desire to use Mozilla software at alll let alone dealing with moving over emails and setting it all up from scratch. I have many hundreds of emails on my computer I need to keep when upgrading. This also applies to many years worth of word files. Proton looks like a nice choice forbeing secure and respecting privacy with their email services. I use Outlook for office 2007 and the same for Word. I need not to lose what I have (emails and doc files) and would like to maintain the folder system I use in each if these programs.

I can buy office 2010, 2013 or 2016. I will not use the Microsoft service as my provider. But maybe first i should try Proton with Outlook 2007 and hope it works OK. If it does, great. If not then I can use a new copy of Office as a back-up.

From what I saw looking into OFFice 2016- at least for Outlook, I can turn off all communication with Microsoft and I never do automatic updates. I Google all updates and get third party information on them first. But if 2016 is "bugged" what about 2010 or 2013?

[Thehandyman1957]

I can understand and relate to why you don't want to use a different mail program since you have used it since the
beginning. I remember my first days on outlook express and then office outlook. The biggest reason for me giving up
on those applications was the inability to save and backup my emails and be able to restore them again.
Thus moving to Thunderbird and now Fossamail. I personally never leave copies on the server side of my email provider
and I pay for my email.

So since you are stuck with, or prefer Outlook, I would advise to get the earliest version you can get that is compatible.
If you get to a point that it forces you to have the latest version, it will be the subscription version and your will be screwed.
At this point, you are just buying some time. But eventually you will be forced to deal with M$.

It has been a very long time since I have had any dealings with M$ mail programs.
If I remember right, it's not easy to migrate to other mail programs,
but perhaps after all these years someone has figured that out.
Your taking a lot of steps that require learning.
This is not one I would jump into until you become comfortable with the new things your dealing with.

[mr tribute]

You do as you wish. I have a Hotmail account and a Skype account. I have stopped using Windows, but not necessarily because of the privacy aspect. I wouldn't have those accounts if I really cared about privacy.

You have been writing a lot in the Windows 10 thread so I was a little surprised about your MS Office plans. Even if MS can read your data, encryption can still be valuable protection against other parties.

There is nothing right or wrong, it's all about what you want to achieve. You know the story of Microsoft; up to Windows 7 there was not much data hoarding going on. After Windows 7 it exploded. Often people who are interested in encrypted mail and vpn solutions and reject Windows 10 are also more open to choose open source solutions instead of MS Office/Outlook. My previous reply was more of a knee jerk reaction to a post I didn't expect to see from you.

All I can say is: In these times I think open source software is more important than ever. And MS Office is a bloated proprietary solution from a company that is known to hoard data. You might as well get a Hotmail/Live/Outlook account instead of Protonmail (yes, I'm exaggerating ).

Do it your way. Switch to Protonmail and MS Office. When the time is right find yourself a better mail client.

[mr tribute]

@Thehandyman1957
I think you are a worthy winner of the unofficial Pale Moon avatar and signature competition. Many fine avatars you have displayed during my time here.

[Thehandyman1957]

@Thehandyman1957
I think you are a worthy winner of the unofficial Pale Moon avatar and signature competition. Many fine avatars you have displayed during my time here.

Off-topic:
Thank you for your kind complement. Sometimes pictures just pop out to me as I'm reading something on a site
and this one spoke volumes to me. There are many oppression's and oppressors in this world, and sometimes the
only way to carry on is to paint a beautiful picture for our part of the world. It may not last, but I hope so!

As for the signature, I can't remember who quoted it first, but it really hit home for me as something I needed
to really apply to my own life. Glad you like them!

[Mercury]

I need to update Outlook if I want to use it with Proton.

Do you really? Outlook 2007 is not listed as supported, but have you confirmed that it does not work? It looks like ProtonMail uses IMAP, which is pretty standard. The only issue I can see is that Outlook 2007 might not support TLS encryption. That might be a showstopper if it's a hard requirement.

[TwoTankAmin]

Edit 3:35 pm EST
I run Spybot Anti-Beacon which is for blocking telemetry, especially from Microsoft. It shows blocking for Office 2013 and 2016. It shows blocking for grouip policy and scheduled tasks :

Note that office 2010 does not appear on that list. So, I now know MS does collect info on some things, but it also appears as if SpyBot can block them, am I incorrect in this assumption?

You can Ignore everything below the next paragraph.

I emailed them and never heard back. I posted this above:

I can buy office 2010, 2013 or 2016. I will not use the Microsoft service as my provider. But maybe first i should try Proton with Outlook 2007 and hope it works OK. If it does, great. If not then I can use a new copy of Office as a back-up.

I will never have to use MS. Proton does not require one use a local email program. They offer an app that allows their service to interface with Outlook and a few other mail programs. Proton stores emails for its users on a protected server. I have about 1,700 stored on my PC. They are in Outlook 2007. They can be backed up just make a copy of the Outlook.pst folder. I am not worried about that one and data going to MS. I use email as a way to track ongoing things. The most important relates to my hobby business of breeding some rare catfish which I sell. It makes no profit but it does pay for my hobby which was the whole point.

If I recall, I had to get free software to move all my Emails from Outlook express to Outlook. I have not looked, but I would assume there is now such software for changing email formats between all the major email programs.

I will never have to use MS. I will move to Linux when I leave Win 7. I hope to get a dual boot system before then so the transition will be smooth. I have a legit copy of Win 7 OEM in addition to the one I now use in case I need to do this on new hardware build.

And lets not forget that MS was not always "evil." Win 7 is fine, a lot of their earlier other software was fine as well, This should be the case for Office. This is why I am asking for solid advice about the 3 options. More recent is usually more invasive, but not always.

What I need to know here is to be told by somebody who knows for certain of the 3 office versions do any of them collect information which I cannot prevent. I know that Win 8 was released to manufacturing on August 1, 2012, and was released for general availability on October 26, 2012." that is the first time MS was collecting stuff that could not be turned off by the user. Office 2013 was released to manufacturing on August 1, 2012, and was released for general availability on October 26, 2012. So maybe it is still safe or maybe it is not? But at that stage it looks like MS was just starting on the taking your data process on the way to Win 10 and the cloud as big business etc. The extended support for 2010 ends in 2020 and 3 years later for 2013. of course 2016 is even better in this respect if........