Is backing up emails and rest of the information in eM Client necessary if my accounts are cloud accounts - such as Gmail and Hotmail? What are chances of loss from the cloud?
When backing up the web accounts on eM Client will it backup emails for the sync period specified on each of the Accounts or will it backup the life to date emails?
If I do backup continuously on eM Client, when restoring the backup to a new device, will the backup overwrite the mails on web and delete any new (Gmail, Hotmail) emails sent and received on the web after the backup point? What I am saying is that there would be two sets of mails, one on the cloud (web mail account) and other on the backup which would be outdated by a few hours and out of sync.
It is unlikely that your server data will be lost due to a server issue, but not unknown. If it is, your email provider may be able to restore the whole mailbox. Normally they won’t do that if you have deleted it yourself, so what an eM Client backup of your server data ensures is if you deleted your server data by mistake, that you have a way to restore it.
The eM Client backup will only have the data you see in eM Client. So if you are using a time sync period, data you don’t see in eM Client won’t be included.
A normal restore won’t affect server data. It will replace all local (unsynced) data with what is in the backup, but your server data will remain the same. If you want to restore data that has been removed from the server, you can do an offline partial restore and then move those messages back to the server yourself. This is described here: How to restore backup in eM Client | eM Client
@Gary let’s take an example. Suppose account in question is Google’s Gmail which is set as IMAP. Immediate after restore of eM Client backup on to a new device, and assume no changes have been done on the restored data on eM, and assume the restored data is let to start syncing with the Google servers. Anything on the servers will take precedence and not the other way round, meaning whatever is on the servers will override the newly restored data in eM. Correct?
The logic I am trying to get is whether it is necessary to do backups of cloud emails such as Gmail and Hotmail on eM Client. The only reasons for backing up would be if the Cloud accounts were to get locked up to the user, or one needed an offline/stand alone copies of their emails or when Google or Microsoft servers crashed (which would be the end of the world).
I don’t see other reasons to backup.
Another analogy: If an Android smartphone dies, one would get a new phone, install the Gmail App from the Play Store and all the Gmail.com emails would automatically be pulled from the cloud. One would not be looking around for a ‘backup’ to restore the Gmail emails. Of course one would have to re-do the Gmail app settings again on the new phone but that is a small task.
The same would apply on an email client on a PC.
Therefore, save for a few reasons above, I really see no need for backing up cloud emails such as Hotmail, Gmail on eM Client.