If you haven’t yet started
Windows Mail—and so haven’t yet defined your first mail account—or if
you have multiple accounts and need to set up the others, this section
shows you how to do it within Windows Mail.
Specifying Basic Account Settings
Here are the steps to
follow to set up an email account with just the basic settings (which
should be enough to get most accounts up and running):
1. | Start the process using one of the following techniques:
Start Windows Mail for the first time. In
Windows Mail, select Tools, Accounts to display the Internet Accounts
dialog box, click Add to open the Select Account Type dialog box, click
E-mail Account, and then click Next.
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2. | Type your display name—this is the name that appears in the From field when you send a message—and click Next.
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3. | Type the email address for the account and click Next.
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4. | Specify your mail server data (click Next when you’re done):
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| Incoming Mail Server Type | Use this list to select the incoming mail server type: POP3 or IMAP. | | Incoming E-mail Server Name | Type the domain name for your incoming mail server. | | Outgoing E-mail Server (SMTP) Name | Type the domain name for your outgoing mail server.
| | Outgoing Server Requires Authentication | Activate
this check box if your Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) server
requires authentication before it will send your messages. |
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5. | Type your email username and your password, and then click Next.
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6. | After
Windows Mail sets up your account, it connects to your incoming mail
server and downloads your waiting messages. If you don’t want this to
happen (for example, you might prefer to leave the messages on the
server), activate the Do Not Download My E-mail at This Time check box.
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7. | Click Finish.
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8. | If you started from the Internet Accounts dialog box, click Close.
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When the wizard
completes its labors, your new account appears in the Mail section of
the Internet Accounts dialog box, as shown in Figure 1
(note, too, the predefined account for the Microsoft Communities
newsgroups). The next few sections use this dialog box, so you might
want to leave it open for now. You can always return to it by selecting
Tools, Accounts.
Setting the Default Account
If
you have more than one account, you should specify one of them as the
default account. The default account is the one Windows Mail uses
automatically when you send a message. To set the default account,
select it in the Mail group and then click Set as Default.
Note
It is
possible to send a message using any of your accounts. However, sending
a message using anything other than the default account requires an
extra step.
Specifying Advanced Account Settings
Although the
basic account settings that you specify during the account setup process
suffice in most cases, many accounts require a more advanced setup. For
example, your Internet Service Provider (ISP) might require a different
SMTP port or you might prefer to leave copies of your messages on the
server.
To work with the
advanced settings, select an account in the Mail group and then click
Properties. The properties sheet that appears contains a number of tabs,
and most of the controls in this dialog box are straightforward. The
next four sections take you through some of the other options and show
how useful they can be.
Using a Different Reply Address
It’s
occasionally useful to have replies sent to a different address. For
example, if you’re sending a message requesting feedback from a number
of people, you might prefer that the return messages go to a colleague
or assistant for collating or processing. Similarly, if you send a
work-related message from a personal account, you might want replies
sent to your work account.
To specify a
different reply address, display the General tab in the account’s
properties sheet, and then type the address in the Reply Address text
box.
Enabling SMTP Authentication
With spam such a big problem these days, many ISPs now require SMTP authentication
for outgoing mail, which means that you must log on to the SMTP server
to confirm that you are the person sending the mail (as opposed to some
spammer spoofing your address). If your ISP uses authentication, display
the Servers tab in the account’s properties sheet, and then
activate the My Server Requires Authentication check box. By default,
Windows Mail logs you on using the same username and password as your
incoming mail server. If your ISP has given you separate logon data,
click Settings, activate the Log On Using option, type your account name
and password, and click OK.
Specifying a Different SMTP Port
For security
reasons, some ISPs insist that all their customers’ outgoing mail route
through the ISP’s SMTP server. This usually isn’t a problem if you’re
using an email account maintained by the ISP, but it can lead to
problems if you’re using an account provided by a third party (such as
your website host):
Your ISP
might block messages sent using the third-party account because it
thinks you’re trying to relay the message through the ISP’s server (a
technique often used by spammers).
You
might incur extra charges if your ISP allows only a certain amount of
SMTP bandwidth per month or a certain number of sent messages, whereas
the third-party account offers higher limits or no restrictions at all.
You might have performance problems because the ISP’s server takes much longer to route messages than the third-party host.
You might think that you
can solve the problem by specifying the third-party host’s SMTP server
in the account settings. However, this doesn’t usually work because
outgoing email transmits by default through port 25; when you use this
port, you must also use the ISP’s SMTP server.
To work around this,
many third-party hosts offer access to their SMTP server via a port
other than the standard port 25. To configure an email account to use a
nonstandard SMTP port, display the Advanced tab in the account’s
properties sheet, and then use the Outgoing Mail (SMTP) text box to type
the port number specified by the third-party host.
Checking the Same Account from Two Different Computers
In today’s increasingly
mobile world, it’s common to have to check the same email account from
multiple devices. For example, you might want to check your business
account using not only your work computer, but also using your home
computer or your notebook while traveling or using a PDA or other
portable device while commuting.
Unfortunately, after
you download a message, the server deletes it from the server and you
can’t access it from any other device. If you need to check mail on
multiple devices, the trick is to leave a copy of the message on the
server after you download it. That way the message will still be
available when you check messages using another device.
To
tell Windows Mail to leave a copy of each message on the server,
display the Advanced tab in the account’s properties sheet, and activate
the Leave a Copy of Messages on the Server check box. You can also
activate the following options:
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| Remove from Server After X Days | If
you activate this check box, Windows Mail automatically deletes the
message from the server after the number of days specified in the spin
box. |
| Remove from Server When Deleted from ‘Deleted Items’ | If
you activate this check box, Windows Mail deletes the message from the
server only when you permanently delete the message from your system. |
Here’s a good strategy to follow:
On your main computer, activate the Leave a Copy of Messages on the Server check box and the Remove from Server After X Days check box. Set the number of days long enough so that you have time to download the messages using your other devices.
On all your other devices, activate only the Leave a Copy of Messages on the Server check box.
This strategy ensures that you can download messages on all your devices, but it prevents messages from piling up on the server.
Note
Other
occasions could arise when you prefer to leave messages on the server
temporarily. For example, if you’re on the road, you might want to
download the messages to a notebook or to some other computer that
you’re using temporarily. By leaving the messages on the server, you can
still download them to your main computer when you return to the office
or to your home. Similarly, you might want to download your messages
into another email client for testing purposes or for taking advantage
of features in that client but not found in Windows Mail.
