E-Mail Software

[arturo7]

What email program are the cool kids running with Windows7?

I've been using Outlook Express for eons. But, I'm upgrading my rig and OE is no longer offered.

What should I consider? Outlook? Thunderbird? Anything else?


thanks in advance

 

[weirdboy]

All of my email clients are web-based nowadays. Work, personal, whatever.

 

[Golddiggie]

Outlook 2010, part of Office 2010 Professional I got via my TechNet Pro membership... :rockin:

The server, for most of my email, is running Linux, using SquirrelMail... I still use Outlook 2010 to get the messages on this end 99.95% of the time. I also have an Exchange 2010 server here that I'm working to get email routing properly on... Thanks to my ISP blocking ports, it's more difficult than it should be...

Still, very pleased with Outlook 2010 on the sytem (running Windows 7 Pro x64)...

 

[JonW]

Download Windows Live Essential from MS updates. It includes Windows Live mail which is the free replacement for OE. It is better than OE.

Myself, I prefer Outlook/Exchange combo.

 

[Golddiggie]

It is better than OE.

They didn't have to work very hard to get better than OE...

 

[Rick91981]

Outlooks is great, but expensive. Thunderbird is definitely a solid email client though and I would recommend it over Windows Mail.

 

[leviticus]

As a sysadmin, I no longer advise any individual use software e-mail clients when there are such better cloud alternatives out there. The thought of having all of my e-mail downloaded to one computer and accessible/vulnerable only on that computer would scare the crap out of me.

And yes, there are arguments regarding having your e-mails stored in the cloud, but the same issues apply unless you're running your own SMTP server with a public MX record (which I would NEVER suggest).

Bottom line: give Gmail a shot. (IMO)

 

[jbrookeiv]

I use Gmail for personal email and Outlook/Exchange at work. Having access to the Exchange server wherever I'm at defeats the cloud argument for me, and having it sync calendars & contacts with my iPhone makes Outlook trump any other solution. Also, the in-depth inbox search Outlook provides is awesome, and helps keep me quasi-organized.

 

[leviticus]

Well, those are all the benefits of Exchange (which is by design, a 'corporate cloud'), not Outlook. Most individuals don't have access to an exchange server for their personal use, and gmail can sync calendars & contacts to devices in the same way that Exchange can.

I was impressed when M$ finally integrated a real indexed search option into Windows ... that's what's giving you your inbox search. However, I dunno if it's got the chops to go toe to toe with the search in gmail.

My biggest complaint of Exchange/Outlook: the storage containers that they use can become unstable when too large. They're also hard to backup when they get sizeable.

 

[arturo7]

As I understand it, a cloud based system would store all of my emails somewhere in space. If I want to access them I need an internet connection. Is this correct?

This absolutely will not work for me. I sometimes travel to remote locations with no internet or cell service. I need everything on my hard drive.

 

[ArcaneXor]

I have been using Thunderbird for years now. The e-mails are still stored on the IMAP server, so I can always re-download them if my computer crashes.

 

[leviticus]

Actually, Google has already thought of that scenario as welll; 'offline gmail' started as a labs (experimental) feature, and has since graduated to a regular feature. I don't use it myself, so I can't speak to it directly.

 

[Hermit]

As I understand it, a cloud based system would store all of my emails somewhere in space. If I want to access them I need an internet connection. Is this correct?

This absolutely will not work for me. I sometimes travel to remote locations with no internet or cell service. I need everything on my hard drive.

Thunderbird and IMAP. Google does nothing for nothing. I simply don't trust them not to be data mining anything of mine they have on their site.

 

[Homercidal]

Most email systems will allow you to download a copy of you email to your client and retain a copy on the server as well.

I enjoy having my own server and I usually access it via web browser. Qmail with Squirrelmail. A friend has Sendmail with Openwebmail. Both work fine.

I did prefer having outlook with exchange at work, but when we got off the corporation, we have our mail hosted on an ISP. The interaction between Outlook and their Qmail system works, but not as well as Exchange.

A couple of guys here use Thunderbird for both personal email and work email. I think it works very well for them. I have not use it for many many years.

I installed Windows Live mail for a lady and I think it works fine with her Gmail, but she recently told me that she basically doesn't do email anymore and just messages on facebook. So I don't have much experience with Live Mail. From the install and configuration it looks like the next evolution of OE.

Forgot to mention that we use IMAP for all of these. At least the ones I have control over. It works better for our purposes.