Importing .PRF Files Into Outlook 2007 in Vista
If you have a hosted Exchange account, you’ve probably dealt with the PRF file: it’s an automated setup file that you just double-click and it configures Outlook for you. Totally slick. But in Outlook 2007, Microsoft broke changed something and you can no longer easily import the PRF settings. There’s a way to do it under Windows Vista, but it’s slightly more involved. The instructions below are adapted from my hosted Exchange provider 4Smartphone.
- Download the PRF file from your hosted Exchange provider and put it on your desktop.
- Click Start, and then click Run. On Vista just type Run and his Enter. This will open Run command box.
- In Open field, type the following and don’t forget the quotes. You may want to copy/paste this into the RUN box and just change the variables: outlook.exe /importprf “C:\Users\USERNAME\Desktop\FILENAME.prf”
- Let Outlook 2007 do it’s thing - you’ll have to enter your username and password as part of the setup process.
And that’s it!
Posts
February 8th, 2007 at 6:12 pm
I just installed the Office 2007 Pro upgrade and I’ve got an unrecognized filetype error after following your instructions. Any suggestions?
February 8th, 2007 at 8:05 pm
Aha!
“C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office12\Outlook.exe ” /importprf “C:\Users\[username]\Desktop\[filename].prf”
From Using Command lines
February 8th, 2007 at 10:54 pm
Hmm. I’m not sure why my method didn’t work, but I do know that I had to try it a few times before I got it to work correctly…
February 19th, 2007 at 6:29 pm
I’ve just verified that this is what works for me:
C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office12\Outlook.exe /importprf “C:\Users\Jason Dunn\Desktop\FILENAME.prf”