E-mail Client Poll

[epp_b]

Just curious to see who is using what and why :)I use Eudora because it's...

• Great for managing and archiving large amounts of e-mail, also makes it easy to search and find e-mail that you're looking for.
• Not susceptible to any of the vulnerabilities Outlook and Outlook Express are (when using Eudora's own built-in basic HTML engine).
• Loads of features and options that let you customize the yin-yang out of it.
• MDI allows you to manage your e-mail far more quickly than many other clients.

[Jeber]

I agree with all your reasons. I've been using Eudora for about 1.5 years, and have yet to have problems with it. And I get 0 (zero) spam. But that's because the advertisers know I'm poor and can't afford their stuff. I never liked O.E. (too limited), but in a lot of ways I do like Outlook, especially the Outlook in Office 2003 beta. But the security issues keep me staying with Eudora.

[zlim]

PocoMail. I did not want to use OE and I wanted something fairly simple.

[Cluttermagnet]

PocoMail. I did not want to use OE and I wanted something fairly simple.

Me too. I use an early version of this utility, Pocomail V2.5. Works great, and is one of those 'safe' email clients that are less likely to have virus/worm attacks like Outlook/ OE if poorly set up and managed. My 3 favorites, with great functionality plus safe behavior are Pegasus, Pocomail, and Eudora. Overall I like Pegasus the best, but the other 2 are great!

[zox]

Foxmail, it suits me and my use )I don't need anything more), much nicer looking than most of the e-mail clients including OE and more secure than OE.Nice remote management tool and powerfull filtering engine.

[JerryM]

I use a local ISP, and my email comes in to that ISP. I use OE to retrieve the mail so that I do not have to go to the ISP site. I also like the easier OE than my ISP email. If I went to Eudora, would it retrieve the mail from my ISP or is the mail sent directly to Eudora as would be Hotmail for instance. I have liked OE, but it does have some sedurity problems. Evidently Eudora does not have such problems, so it it will function as OE I would like to try it.Can I substitute it directly for OE? Will FrontGate and Mailwasher work with it?Thanks,Jerry

[Cluttermagnet]

I use a local ISP, and my email comes in to that ISP. I use OE to retrieve the mail so that I do  not have to go to the ISP site. I also like the easier OE than my ISP email. If I went to Eudora, would it retrieve the mail from my ISP or is the mail sent directly to Eudora as would be Hotmail for instance. I have liked OE, but it does have some sedurity problems. Evidently Eudora does not have such problems, so it it will function as OE I would like to try it.Can I substitute it directly for OE? Will FrontGate and Mailwasher work with it?Thanks,Jerry

Hi, Jerry-Welcome to Scot's Forums. Regarding "direct substitution for OE", that is kind of a loaded question in that no two different email programs have 100 percent overlap of features. All this really means is that if you want to try some other ones, you have to get used to slightly different ways of doing the same basic task- downloading, reading, writing, uploading, and storing emails.The short answer to your question is definitely that all those other email programs others are talking about would also do a fine job with email for you, and none of them would make it necessary for you to 'visit' your ISP site (like navigating there using your browser). BTW programs like Mailwasher are specialty programs that allow you to prescan your emails at your ISP without having to actually download the emails to read/screen them. Plenty of email programs will do this, too, very similar to Mailwasher except that they do not generate phony 'bounce' messages to send back for spam emails. They will, however, allow you to view the subject lines, sizes, sender address, etc. of emails still sitting on your server without downloading them- and you can tell the server to delete obvious spam right there on the server without ever downloading it- just like Mailwasher does.In general, you could probably be happy with any number of email 'clients' in place of Outlook or OE, if you take the time to learn to use each one and accept their differences. BTW a 'client' is simply a piece of software that sits on your own computer hard drive and sends/receives emails between you and your ISP. This is generally the best way to go for most email, but the online, web-based ones like Hotmail and Yahoo and all the others have their place too. They make good throwaways that you can abandon if you start getting way too many spam emails on them.I recommend in particular two free ones that work great, Pegasus and the free version of Eudora. Both are excellent clients and if you take the time to really learn them, you will thank yourself later. Probably the hardest thing of all is learning which info you need to give the programs so they can talk to your ISP and upload/ download emails. You can ask for help here if you need it and plenty of folks can answer any queations you may have. Usually all you need to give for info is a receive address like "pop.isp.com" and a send address like "smtp.isp.com" and your online ID and your ISP password. Set a few items like that and the programs come alive and do everything pretty much that OE does, sometimes even better. Try a few of the free clients but do get advice so you don't choose ones that abuse their users by planting spyware, etc. Read in Scot's Forums and you can search and find where folks have recommended the best ones to use.Just a personal prejudice, but I strongly recommend you stay away from any 'html' emailers. Most programs allow you to enable that or disable it. You should disable html because it can be exploited to download malicious programs in emails. Stick with plain text on a white background, never set up and use that fancy html with all the cutsie little animals and fancy backgrounds and stupid animated icons. If you accept that junk, sooner or later you might get hacked by a malicious html email. Better safe than sorry. Stick with plain text emails. If you want to see all sorts of jazzy html stuff, use your browser and go visit websites to do that.

[havnblast]

MS Outlook in windows and Thunderbird in Linux - I prefer Evolution - I like having the calendar schedule and email all in one package. Plus with Evolution you can get RSS feeds

[SonicDragon]

I've been using Mozilla's mail client ever since i switched to Mozilla. It works fine for what i need. There was one release that the mail had a few bugs in, but they seemed to be fixed now.I have also used Pegasus and it's really nice.

[epp_b]

Wow! Well said Cluttermagnet!JerryM, when you say "go to your ISP's site", I think you refer to an e-mail application ('client') that your ISP has set up to work online, instead of having to install software on your local machine. These types of services are seeming to become more and more popular. They are handy when you're away, but have access to an internet-connected computer, for example.When you view your e-mail online with your ISP provided tool, you can manage your e-mail all online, send, receive and do whatever you want with it.When you use your offline e-mail client (such as Outlook, OE, Eudora, or Pmail), it will download all of the e-mail left in the inbox of your ISP's e-mail service (e-mail in the other mailboxes usually stays there until you do something about it).To agree with Cluttermagnet, the conclusive answer is yes. You can use any e-mail client you wish to manage your e-mail. Eudora or Pegasus (A.K.A. Pmail) are probably your best choices (my favorite feature of both these e-mail clients are their MDI capabilities -- they can have more than one mailbox or message open at once without having to open multiple instances of the program). And, of course, any non-Outlook based e-mail client will not be susceptible to the vulnerabilities OE and Outlook are (virus scanners cannot nix this issue)As well, you should be able to use any 3rd-party Spam and Virus filters, as long as they say that they are compatible with whatever e-mail client you choose (I've heard nothing but good from Spamnix for Eudora). As far as virus scanning goes, NAV '02 and up should scan any POP e-mail client you choose (which includes all of the e-mail clients I listed in the 2nd above paragraph). Otherwise, there are also plenty of 3rd-party virus scanners compatible with multiple e-mail clients out there.Good luck

[GolfProRM]

I've been a Mozilla Thunderbird user ever since I found it back in April... It's just reaching a 0.1 release, so has quite a ways to go, but it's been my only email software since I tested it. It's nice to have a free, open-source email program that can be customized to your liking with extensions, as well as the ability to "home-build" your own, customized version. Give this program a few months, and it'll be as ready to go as Firebird is!

[JerryM]

cluttermagnet and epp b,Thanks a lot for your excellent explanations.I have downloaded Eudora, but I notice that there are two free versions; a sponsored mode, and a light mode.Which would you recommend before I install. I assume I must decide when I install the program.Thanks,Jerry

[epp_b]

All three modes are included in the one setup file that you download. You can choose which mode you want to use during the installation. And then there's another great thing about Eudora -- it doesn't matter what mode you choose to run, because you can always change it back to however you want after the installation Sponsered and Paid mode are virtually the same: You get exactly the same features and options in both modes -- the only difference is that, in sponsered mode, you get a couple of advertisements. However, I would recommend sponsered mode. The ads are placed very strategically in order to be non-obtrusive. There's one ad that docks on the left-hand corner and a small toolbar on the top with 1 - 3 ads at a time. I hardly notice them anymore.Light mode will give you fewer options (you may lose options such as IMAP capabilities, toolbars, customizations, etc), but there no advertisements in light mode.

[JerryM]

I have installed Eudora, the free version with adds.However, I can’t receive mail. Here is the message after telling me that I do not have any mail.<dominant>, Logging into POP server User ---110 4;45 pm Error reading from network Cause, connection closed by foreign host. (0)I also notice that Eudora is not listed in my Accounts in Frontgate. It does not seem to have found it yet.All in all, I haven’t been able to get it to work.HELP?Thanks,Jerry

[Martini Lover]

You can call me E-Z. I like OE, like me its e-z to use, keeps track of all the families emails and I use common sense when I open anything, especially any thing with a attachment. I do use mailwasher also, and it get rid of 80% of the daily spam.

[nlinecomputers]

I am an OUTLOOK XP user. I know all about all the secuirty issues with it but it hasn't been a problem for me. I keep my AV program upto date, use a firewall, and am usually up on my M$ patches. I use OUTLOOK because it is the only PIM that has email, calendar, and contacts that is easy to use and manage. I need all those features but something like ACT! is overkill.

[Peachy]

Add me to the OE pile even though I know better; but it hasn't been a problem for me since moving to XP. Earlier versions I had had a tendency to have its Inbox corrupted. At work I have to use GroupWise (Pegause Mail before that) since we are a Novell shop and I don't mind it. It has a very easy to use calendar that is actually useful sometimes. It's amazing but the people who are the power GroupWise users are the administrative and secretarial staff. Us techies sometimes don't use it half as much as they do.

[RandomBox]

I use OutLook which is part of OfficeXP for my main ISP provided POP3 email account!I use OutLookExpress for my 2 Hotmail Accounts!I use YahooMail for my two accounts with them! I have used YahooPOPs for retrieving them from OutlookExpress but ...........I use FastMail account for everything else since it is spam and clutter-free!I was forced to "vote" with the last choice as the poll does not allow for multiple entries!

[volunteer]

I've been using OE for so long it just feels natural. I do plan on trying some alternatives such as Eudora and Pegasus. In linux, I'm using Evolution which is taking me a while to figure it all out.When I find one that has a good spam filter and let's me read the header and delete it on the server, I'll drop OE.Ken

[epp_b]

I have installed Eudora, the free version with ads.However, I can’t receive mail. Here is the message after telling me that I do not have any mail.<dominant>, Logging into POP server User ---110 4;45 pm Error reading from network  Cause, connection closed by foreign host. (0)

Check your mail login info under Tools > Options and see the sections:

• Getting Started
• Checking mail
• Incoming mail
• Sending mail

I also notice that Eudora is not listed in my Accounts in Frontgate. It does not seem to have found it yet.

I have never used FrontGate, but I would think that you have to configure the account with FrontGate using the programs options or configuration panel.

[Cluttermagnet]

I have installed Eudora, the free version with ads.However, I can’t receive mail. Here is the message after telling me that I do not have any mail.<dominant>, Logging into POP server User ---110 4;45 pmError reading from network  Cause, connection closed by foreign host. (0)

I have found that, almost universally, failure of a newly-installed email client to connect and view/ download email traces back to incorrect settings in the new email program. Get them right ('letter perfect') and things will start to work. I have absolutely no idea what "Frontgate" is. You would have to bring me up to speed on that. I suspect, however, that Frontgate is not your problem (but what does Frontgate do?)I set up a couple of email clients recently for a friend who is on Comcast cable. Even though I had zero experience with broadband at that time, and had some worries about possibly needing to use different syntax to talk to their servers, it turned out that the settings needed inside each email client to get them running were totally identical to what I would enter if I were setting up another computer that was connected to dialup, as I am.Your error message where it refers to "Error reading from network- Cause, connection closed by foreign host" I would interpret like this: the "foreign host" is your ISP server, and the reason the email client could not "read from the network" was because the server closed the connection- and probably the reason it did that was because you do not yet have your settings right. If you fail to sign on with letter-perfect syntax and give your correct ID and password, the server says "get the heck out of here- I don't know you!" and hangs up! Again, the 'basic four' items to communicate with your server will be a 'receive' address, a 'send' address, your password, and your user ID. Let's say your ISP is called joeschmo.com- then your receive address will (probably) be "pop.joeschmo.com" (without the quote marks!) and your send address will be "smtp.joeschmo.com". If your user ID on that ISP is "jerry", then that is what you must supply, but note carefully that sometimes ISP's have a nasty habit of giving a more 'special' ID strictly for login.For example, my sister is known as (this is made up to illustrate) "B597@wookie.net" but the special ID they gave her to log in with is "wookie4775". Go figure. I guess this is because whe is using one of those resellers who use the 3-4 major backbone vendors (you pick which one). My sister's ISP is out on the west coast, but she lives on the east coast and just logs into any local number of the national backbone company she picked. So she is the 4,775th person to sign up with the "wookie" ISP who has chosen backbone network #3. For every other purpose, she is known as "B597", but for ISP login only, she has to use "wookie4775". There can be no guessing on this. You just have to know what ID to use, and that initial email your ISP sent you when you first signed up with them tells you that, for the record. Lost the email? You can either poke around in the defaults in OE or Outlook to find these settings, or you can ask your ISP- but be prepared to prove to them that you are you. The password is self-explanatory, but again, you must be sure you have the correct one that your ISP gave you when you first signed up. If you saved it, you should have received an email from your ISP giving your user ID that you chose (or they assigned) and your unique password you (or they) chose. If you changed it later, well, you better remember the right one! Or again ask them. Computers are just really persnickety cusses, and they have this bad habit of expecting us to always get everything syntactically perfect. Screw up your syntax even a tiny bit and nothing works- and the computer is bugging you with error messages. Passwords can be real fussy, too, if they are 'strong' passwords that use upper and lower case plus numerals plus punctuation marks, etc.- like "d7*G;?vBgi5:'+]". Try typing that sucker correctly, even going slowly. I signed onto Scot's Forums tonight with a different browser and I had to give my password to post, and I typed it slowly while looking at a written copy of it- and it _still_ took me 3 tries to get it entered right! Man those 'strong' passwords are murder!. I have a strong hunch that your only problem with Eudora is getting the 'basic four' set right in the programs setup. Let us know how you are doing! In particular, I would be interesting in hearing back from you that you were successful in finding the 'basic four' by poking around in the Preferences in OE (or Options or whatever they call those settings).Edit July 30, 2003: AddendumIf Frontgate is a software _firewall_ on your hard drive and it is a good one, it will monitor all outgoing traffic to your ISP trying to detect 'phone home' bad guy software installed on your hard drive that is up to no good. If this were the case, in the first instance of your using Eudora and trying to fetch emails or view emails on your ISP server it should pop up a window asking you whether the traffic originated by Eudora is permitted. You would have to tell it yes. If you didn't say yes, I would guess that every time you try to use Eudora to talk to the ISP server, a window should pop up again asking the same question. Fail to say "yes" and the firewall keeps Eudora bottled up on your hard drive. From Eudora's perspective, it would look like a network failure. The error message "connection closed by foreign host" implies that a firewall was _not_ in the way at the time you first tried Eudora. Oh, and let's not overlook the obvious- if you are on dialup, you _were_ connected to the internet at the time you tried Eudora, right?

I also notice that Eudora is not listed in my Accounts in Frontgate. It does not seem to have found it yet.

If Frontgate is firewall-like but it resides on your server ISP or perhaps on the servers of Frontgate (?) and if it indeed throttles outgoing traffic from your machine if it is not "registered", then of course you would have to deal with Frontgate and tell it to let Eudora 'phone out'. It sure does not sound like that, however, judging from your error message.

[Prelude76]

come on, we need more non-Outlook or OE votes here. Outlook and OE are sitting at 50% together. still, it's better than their 80-90% dominance out in general public, but not good enough. help stop spread of worms and viruses. eliminate OE from your menu. i switched my dad's email and my brother's email from OE to mozilla mail. there, i did my part.

[SonicDragon]

i switched my dad's email and my brother's email from OE to mozilla mail. there, i did my part. 

hehehe, i've been making my family use mozilla mail for a while now too

[Hawkfan]

Count me as another non-MS email program user...I use The Bat! as my email program of choice. Fast, light, and just as capable as the other program out there. It's not free but it's worth every penny I paid for it.I used Eudora for a long time (started somewhere in the 1.x versions) but left it to use Pegasus for awhile but finally settled on The Bat!.

[mrainey]

I'm real happy with Calypso, available free from www.RoseCitySoftware.comIt's extremely full-featured, including extensive spam-filtering capabilities.They have an upgraded commercial version which they call Courier. I looked over the new feature description and decided to pass on the upgrade.

[theHammer]

Still using OE but would like to change only because I run two computers at home and would love the flexibility of being able to process mail on either. Tried Pegasus for about six months because it does permit a common database and handles record locking sufficiently well for the occasional times both my wife and I were using the software. However I seemed to run into far to many glitches (I remember several with attachments) that I finally gave up. Seemed I was spending more time on their newsgroup than elsewhere trying to understand yet another user-friendly program (I have only been at this for over 20 years and at times I feel DOS was more friendly). Now, anybody out there have a suggestion for an e-mail package that is LAN compatible (uses a single database) and I mean a really small LAN?Ed

[beeTee]

I was using Outlook for the last few years, but since joining this Forum, I've really soured on M$ products. The security issues alone (not to mention the "Fixes" in Outlook) were enough to jump. Last month, I did a clean install and set up my main browser as Mozilla and adopted it's mail client. It does everything I want/need. Since I plan on staying with Mozilla/Firebird and their respective mail client(s), (whatever the final product turns out to be) I want to be able to not have to screw around with importing and exporting mail and address books and such.Another reason for switching to Mozilla+ is that I use it in Linux. I tried out Evolution, but found it a little weird, I'll have to get 1.4 and see how I like it now. I like the Outlook functionality, and if Evolution has gotten so much better, I will probably adopt it as my main email client.Those of you who think that trying out other email clients is a pain because of contacts/address books migration; Mozilla's import function is a breeze.(There!!!! Prelude : )

[Prelude76]

thanx, beeteeglad to see this forum changing people's computing style. and i totally hear you on "Evolution" in linux. it is very nice indeed. i wish it was ported over to Windows. mozilla mail is D*** sweet, but lacks calendar/notes/scheduling that Outlook and Evolution have. maybe once mozilla thunderbird is finalized, there might be many plugins to add those features. *crosses-fingers*

[JerryM]

Cluttermagnet,Thanks for the post. Everyone has been very helpful. I went to my ISP tech and set up the information as he directed, so I know that was correct.He also thought Norton AV might be the problem since I reached the point where I could send, but could not receive, and NAV checks all incoming and outgoing mail.None of that solved the problem.Dick at http://www.hazeleger.net/cgi-bin/yabb/YaBB...?board=SpamFGMX offered to do an analysis of my computer programs. I think he could have discovered which programs were in conflict with Eudora. He was very gracious in offering his time, which is limited. That is an excellent site if you have not visited it.However, I decided that it was just too much trouble. I have been satisfied with OE in spite of its vulnerabilities. I wanted to try Eudora, as I do other programs which are highly thought of. It just didn't work for me, and I was not willing to go to additional trouble to find out the problem.FrontGate is a spam filter similar to Mailwasher. I have both, and prefer Frontgate. There might have been a conflict between Eudora and FrontGate, but I was not successful in getting FrontGate to recognize Eudora. However, I turned FG off and reinstalled Eudora, but Eudora still did not work.I have FG, Mailwasher (which is not called up until I manually do it), NAV, Proxomitron, Cookiewall, and Kerio firewall, plus Start Up Monitor. All except Mailwasher start at startup.I have been fortunate in the past as new programs install and work without problems. The exception has been Eudora. Proxomitron did require some leauning, but was really not that difficult.I have tried all suggestions, and have come up empty. So I uninstalled Eudora, and chalked it up to experience. I appreciate everyone's interest and help. Sooner or later I will need more help. This is a good place to get it.Jerry

[RandomBox]

Hey JerryM,I just can't believe no one was able to talk you into their fave Email Client! May I recommend a few thoughts if you are going to continue using OutlookExpress6:*Donot use the "Preview" Pane in OE6!*Install a good Virus Protection to check the incoming mail (FREEware of your choice (AVG?))!*Back Up your OE6 data often but most of all; your Address Book even more [errrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr] oftener!*Upgrade every month with available security patches and updates!*For more security, set your Account/pw (or Identity) so that you must log-out/sign-off when exiting!