Windows Live Hotmail Plus on Mac and PC

[tatterjack]

I'm helping a small charity who have one PC (XP) and one PowerMac on which they get their email via Entourage. They have their own domain name. They want to be able to send/receive emails and view all their stored emails on both machines, obviously without too much additional expense.

After some research the best I've come up with is the following and I'd be grateful for any comments or suggestions for alternatives. But chiefly will it work?

1) Register their domain as a free Windows Live Small Business Account
2) Upgrade the windows Live Hotmail account to Plus at £14.99/year
3) Install Windows Live Mail Desktop on the PC
4) Entourage on the Mac and WLMD should now be able to synchronise emails and folders with Hotmail Plus

The one drawback I can see is that Entourage will not sync contacts but i can probably set something up to do that regularly using perhaps Paul Berkowitz script.

Thanks

 

[Diane Ross]

After some research the best I've come up with is the following and I'd be
grateful for any comments or suggestions for alternatives.

I would use an IMAP account...no cost to do this.
Use Google Calendar for events and Plaxo for contacts. Both free.

<http://www.plaxo.com/downloads/mac> I can't get to the link for the pc
download.

 

[tatterjack]

Many thanks for your reply Diane. I had been regrettably ignorant about the capabilities of imap. I note that it depends on our ISP having imap implemented. I assume this means our email hoster rather than our broadband provider so I guess my next step is to contact them.

Events are handled by a different system but contacts will need to be synched. I'll look into Plaxo as well.

Thanks again. I'll post my progress.

Graham.

 

[Diane Ross]

Many thanks for your reply Diane. I had been regrettably ignorant about the
capabilities of imap. I note that it depends on our ISP having imap
implemented. I assume this means our email hoster rather than our broadband
provider so I guess my next step is to contact them.

Both should allow you to set as IMAP. The only restrictions you need to
check is the limit you are allowed to keep on server. I suspect that the
charity will not have loads of email so that shouldn't be an issue.

Just be sure to keep the spam deleted. Gmail accounts are great because they
will delete spam after xx days and you do not download spam at all. It's all
on the server so you can check for "good" mail. I find their spam filter to
be highly reliable. Gmail accounts are free. If you need more space, their
pro accounts are available.

Connect Entourage 2004 to Gmail¹s IMAP service

<http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/2007/11/connect_entourage_2004_to_gmails_ima
p_service.html>

Create Gmail labels and make Entourage folders

<http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/2007/11/create_gmail_labels_and_make_entoura
ge_folders.html>

Gmail Account <http://www.entourage.mvps.org/accounts/gmail.html>Gmail
Account <http://www.entourage.mvps.org/accounts/gmail.html>

Hope this helps!

 

[tatterjack]

Thanks again for your replies Diane.

I've discovered the email provider (low cost names lcn.com) do not provide imap so gmail looks like the way to go. We can use our own domain name and imap. The server storage limit may be a problem not because of the daily email load but because they want a historic view on both machines.

I'm just a tad surprised that you've suggested a Google solution rather than Microsoft.

 

[Diane Ross]

I'm just a tad surprised that you've suggested a Google solution rather than
Microsoft.

MVPs are independent. We are not Microsoft employees and try to give the
best advice we can for users. We don't bash Microsoft, but if criticism is
deserved we aren't shy about giving our opinion.

With any free service you get what you pay for. Always backup your email to
your computer if it's important. Even Gmail has had problems with accounts
that either locked the user out and/or deleted all their mail.

 

[tatterjack]

Point taken about backups. And thanks for the unbiased advice. It gives me a lot of confidence in this forum. Email is changing rapidly and Microsoft seem a bit behind the curve.