problem with virgin email address on windows mail

silvercar

So my main email address is with virgin, actually an @ntlworld.com one.

I have a new laptop and am trying to set up the mail using windows mail. The problem I have is that I am trying to add the account to the mail app and it says the account already exists, login to your microsoft account. This is because I have a microsoft  windows account using this @ntlworld address that is my access to this machine along with my Teams account etc. My microsoft windows account uses the same email but with a different password to my email account.

So the mail account tells me the (email address) account already exists and won't let me proceed.

Any ideas gratefully received.

[Deleted User]

When you get the "Add an account" screen, are you selecting "Other account" as per screen shot below?

silvercar

Yes I am. 

But as soon as I enter the email address, which is the first screen after the one in your pic, it tells me I already have an account and to log in with it. 

grumpycrab

Change your account on the machine from a Microsoft account to a local account.

silvercar

grumpycrab said:

Change your account on the machine from a Microsoft account to a local account.

I don’t know how it came to be a Microsoft account in the first place. I registered it for Teams ages ago and that seems to have made it a Microsoft account, it now pops up often eg when I look at passwords on google chrome, I have to give the Microsoft pin for this email address.

im a bit out of my depth here, as you may have gathered

Neil_Jones

Registering for any Microsoft service - Hotmail/Outlook/MSN, XBox, Office, Teams - will give you a Microsoft account.

Unfortunately all of these programs on a Windows 10 machine will immediately say to you, can I use these details to sign into everything and then some more, and if you're not watching what you click, that's what it will do.

Also of course when Windows 10 is setup the first thing it will bug you for is an MS account, but this only happens if you were connected to the internet at the time.  What they don't tell you is what happens when you're offline, and because Windows always needs an account, if it can't make one online it'll make one offline, and bug the crap out of you to convert it.

However you can convert an online/MS account to a local one quickly and easy:

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/switch-your-windows-10-device-to-a-local-account-eb7e78a9-88ee-9bc3-8f06-831b56e339fd