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Choose your Mail Software

author-image
PCQ Bureau
New Update

There are lots of e-mail clients around, some of which are

small and fast, some big and slow. Some are friendly, other’s rather cryptic. Here we

look at the most popular mail clients and tell you what each one does and how well.

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FoxMail 2.1

color="#FFFFFF">FoxMail 2.1

A free e-mail client.



Features: Multiple POP3 accounts, remote mailbox administration, mail filters, HTML
message preview.



Pros: Simple interface.


Cons: No shell account and MAPI support, some minor bugs.


Source: www.aerofox.com/fox (520 kB
download).



FoxMail supports multiple POP mailboxes, HTML message

preview (in IE 3 or 4 browser component) and a really cool remote mailbox tool that lets

you kill huge attachments right on the mail server. Filters help you sort mail into

user created folders or dump spam into your trash mailbox based upon the contents of the

From, To, CC or Subject lines. The address book lets you import Eudora or Netscape address

books. However, it’s not possible to export a FoxMail address book to some other

e-mail app. FoxMail also lets you import and export messages to and from Exchange and

Outlook. The standard features such as signatures, labels and message sorting are all

available. It has some minor bugs. Sometimes you can’t copy text from an HTML

formatted message to the clipboard. The cursor doesn’t land up in the To text box

when you compose a new message.

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color="#FFFFFF">Eudora Light 3.06

A free e-mail client.



Features: Shell account support.


Pros: Fast, powerful and easy to use.


Cons: Doesn’t support multiple mailboxes, dated interface.


Source: Qualcomm.www.eudora.com/eudoralight
(5 MB download).



Eudora Light 3.06

Eudora Light is the only mail client around that supports

shell accounts in addition to TCP/IP. This app has all the standard features–filters,

address book, signatures, etc. You can check periodically for mail, skip large messages

over a particular kB limit and use filters to look for text and copy or move a

message to another folder or change the priority of the message. Rich text is

supported but HTML rendering is far from perfect. So what’s wrong? Well, Eudora Light

hasn’t seen an upgrade for quite some time.

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color="#FFFFFF">Netscape Messenger

A mail client that’s

part of Netscape Communicator.



Features: Supports filtering, HTML messages, IMAP.


Pros: Reliable and easy to use.


Cons: Doesn’t support multiple POP accounts.


Source: Any Communicator distribution on the PC Quest CD.


Netscape Messenger

Netscape Messenger is the Mail and News client that comes

as part of Netscape Communicator 4.x. It’s a simple but robust mail client with few

frills. You can do all the standard stuff such as sending attachments, filtering mail,

etc. Some neat features include the ability to bookmark your messages. You can find people

in online directories such as Four11, WhoWhere, or Bigfoot without leaving Messenger

from the address book. There’s also a notification tool that checks your mail in the

background, without requiring you to open Messenger. While Messenger isn’t exactly

bursting to the brim with features, it’s a solid and usable mail and news client.

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color="#FFFFFF">Eudora Pro 4.1

An e-mail client. Rs

1,950




Features: Advanced filtering, full HTML preview. Supports IMAP and multiple
accounts.




Pros: Very powerful and still easy to use.


Cons: It’s not free.


Source: Avda Comptech, 443/40/2, 9th Cross, Mahalakshmi Layout, Bangalore 560086.
Tel: 80-3322624 Fax: 3322624 E-mail: avda@

giasbg01.vsnl.net.in
RQS# E04101


Eudora Pro 4.1

If you like Eudora Light but want a little more power and a

more up to date interface, Eudora Pro 4.1 could be for you. But keep in mind that unlike

most of the apps reviewed here, Eudora Pro is a commercial software and has to be bought

for Rs 1,950. Other than the new interface, Pro has more powerful filtering options

than Eudora Light, a better address book (you can enter the fax, phone, address and other

details).

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Pro can check several e-mail accounts. A new

account wizard leads you through setting up your e-mail account. You can import existing

settings, e-mail and address books from Outlook, Outlook Express or Netscape Mail. Eudora

Pro 4 supports HTML mail using either an internal HTML viewer or IE 4. Eudora Pro

can also work with IE 3 but its built-in HTML viewer is better. The tabbed Win 95 taskbar

style interface for navigating your mailboxes and filters is really nice. Eudora Pro has

IMAP support that lets you view your e-mail at the server. Using LDAP you can query any of

the popular e-mail address databases on the Web (Four 11,etc), for finding a person’s

e-mail address. A spell checker and a dockable and customizable toolbar round off

this powerful and elegant app. You can download the standard edition from href="http://%20ftp://ftp.qualcomm.com/eudora/eudorapro/windows/english/demo41/ep41demo.exe.">

ftp://ftp.qualcomm.com/eudora/eudorapro/windows/english/demo41/ep41demo.exe.

color="#FFFFFF">Outlook Express
An e-mail

client that comes with IE 4.



Features: Supports multiple POP accounts.


Pros: Powerful filters, functional spell checker.


Cons: Tends to hang when you cancel a mail download that’s taking too long.


Source: www.microsoft.com/ie or any IE 4
distribution on the PC Quest CD.



Outlook Express

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If you’ve got IE 4 installed on your PC, you’ve

probably also got Outlook Express. This is MS’s replacement for Internet Mail.

Outlook Express is cute and has enough bells and whistles to keep even the most feature

happy user busy for ages. The app comes with almost every feature you’ll need

including support for multiple POP accounts, an elegant interface, powerful filters and a

functional spell checker. However, the fancy stationary can make it tough for other people

to read your mail. If you like IE 4 you’ll probably like Outlook Express.

color="#FFFFFF">Cwebmail

A mail utility. $10

registration.



Features: Lets you check your Hotmail or Yahoo! mail account using a POP3 client.


Pros: Saves Internet hours.


Cons: Not free.


Source: 30-day free trial from http://cwebmail.com/




Cwebmail

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Cwebmail lets you check your Web-mail account at Hotmail or

Yahoo mail using a regular e-mail client such as Eudora. You just need to configure your

SMTP and POP server information to Cwebmail’s servers ( href="http://hotmail.cwebmail.com">hotmail.cwebmail.com and href="http://yahoo.cwebmail.com">yahoo.cwebmail.com). The help file has instructions

on configuring Outlook Express, Outlook, Eudora and other popular mail clients. The app

works quite well though it’s a little slower than using a plain old POP account.

color="#FFFFFF">Magic Mail Monitor

Tray POP-mail checker.

Free.



Features: You can check all your POP accounts from a single app that runs in the
background.



Pros: Saves you the trouble of launching your mail client, handy in deleting spam.


Cons: None.


Source: www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Vista/2576/magic.html


Magic Mail Monitor

This is a program that sits in your system tray, monitoring

all your POP accounts for new mail. It’s very configurable and lets you set the time

interval after which new mail is checked and alerts you using a sound or just by popping

up a window listing the new messages and so forth. Magic Mail even lets you view (using

Notepad) or delete messages directly from the server. The Quick Reply option lets you

reply to the mail in your default mail client.

color="#FFFFFF">Pegasus Mail 3.02

A free e-mail client.



Features: Supports encryption, multiple users with passwords, network
"newsgroups".



Pros: Good for e-mail on LAN.


Cons: Hard to use, very confusing interface.


Source: www.pegasus.usa.com/dl/


Pegasus Mail 3.02

Pegasus Mail is very powerful with options such as multiple

users, network support (using NetWare) and encryption. Unfortunately it also has a

confusing and complicated interface. Pegasus supports MAPI, rich text, HTML messages (not

too well) and can be set up in single or multi-user mode (here each user has to enter a

username and password to log into the mail client). It supports rules based filtering to

keep out spam. A Finger tool is part of the mailer as is LDAP support. The switchboard

feature lets you create a local "newsgroup" on a shared network folder.

That’s the good stuff. The downside is that Pegasus

has a rather old-fashioned interface that reminds you of a badly designed Windows 3.x

application. The screen is cluttered and confusing with enough options to frighten the

average user.

IMAP

face="arial" size="2">The Internet Message Access Protocol lets you view your e-mail at

the server treating the server mailbox as an extension of your computer. You can view,

delete and search for mail on the server.

LDAP

Lightweight

Directory Access Protocol is a set of protocols for querying information directories

including popular e-mail databases on the Web, such as Four 11 for finding a person’s

e-mail address when you aren’t sure about it.

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