The deadline has come for MSU e-mail users to upgrade to the university's new mail system and leave Pilot behind.

At 6 a.m. Tuesday, Pilot accounts will become inaccessible. All e-mails sent to non-upgraded accounts will bounce back and fill inboxes with "return to sender" messages.

All saved mail in the Pilot program will remain until June 1, when the Pilot server will be shut down and the hardware physically removed.

Academic Computing and Network Services, formerly known as the MSU Computer Center, has been actively getting deadline information out to the public with advertisements, seminars and mass mailings.

"It's going to be hard for someone to say they didn't know it was going to be shut down," said Scott Thomas, division manager for client services for Academic Computing and Network Services.

The last mass e-mail, sent about two weeks ago, revealed about 4,000 current students and 5,000 faculty and staff members who had not yet upgraded to Webmail.

But that number should have dropped significantly as many departments waited until spring break to upgrade, Thomas said. A seminar also was given to retired staff and the majority of them probably now have upgraded, he said.

The 4,000 current students could be those who use third-party systems rather than MSU e-mail.

"Our guess is that those 4,000 are ones that don't read their e-mail at all," Thomas said.

Those who forward e-mail from Pilot also need to upgrade to the new Webmail system to continue receiving messages.

The eight-step upgrade process is available at https://mail.msu.edu/upgrade. The process can take up to 10 minutes, depending on the volume of messages saved in the program's folders.

Social work sophomore Katie Schwarz upgraded her e-mail system early in the school year, and said she is surprised more students are not yet using what she calls a "better organized" and "more efficient" system.

"I was worried my mail wouldn't go through anymore on Pilot, and I think I just figured everyone else already switched," she said.

Senior Information Technologist Richard Wiggins said the spring deadline to remove the Pilot system should accommodate most users and allow them access to the more advanced system before school lets out for the summer.

State News staff writer Sonia Khaleel contributed to this report.