Please advise- MS Exchange -what can it do for me?

[Guest shadamehr]

Mmmm - please folks - first can I say, I know lots about Smartphones - but NOTHING at all about Microsoft Exhange, so please try and answer me gently...

But for you Exchange users like Paul etc, can you give me a bit of help here...

I have been offered a deal on 1 and 1 internet's Exchange package, for £3.99 a month for twelve months, as opposed to the normal £5.99 (apologise for what seems like advertising, but it will help if you even know what it is I am talking about here - to be fair, there are OTHER providers available folks and all that technical disclaimer stuff):

http://order.1and1.co.uk/xml/order/MailExc...top&__lf=Static

The thing is, I know very little about this, and what it can offer me etc (Exchange, not the offer).

As it stands right now, I have various domain names etc for me, and also for my partner.

All these domain names for me, simply employ email forwarding to one specific Email hosting account I have, and I download them via normal pop mail into Outlook 2003 on my PC. My partner has a similar setup whereby her domain names all forward to one proper email hosting account she has, with an exception that one of her accounts, given its use, ALSO forwards a copy to my email address (by her wish, not me being nebby).

I SOMETIMES use my mobile for checking my mail, but what holds me back just now is that I use Mailwasher on my PC to screen and wash my mail for spam first before downloading (I get about 80-100 spam a day, to give you a feel for this, to every 10-20 proper mail a day, so you can weigh up my postion).

This screening of course would not be possible when downloading by phone.

So bearing in mind I use a Blackberry heavy for work and love push email (work is entirely unrelated to this plan of mine though, and is not part of what I want to deal with when I mention exchange here - my blackberry is work provided, set up, funded etc), I am therefore also starting to think about Microsoft's forthcoming Push Email...

Also I have heard of a supposed wi-fi sync of Exchange servers or something, via Active Sync (which is the excuse why I have posted in the SmartPhone software section - active sync being the loose cover for my post *lol*).

So given my circumstances as I have described, and knowing less than ZERO about Exchange, or Exchange hosting remotely, which is I think what this offer is, whatever the difference means, then can you clever lot chip in with simple understandable answers as to what this would mean for me - whether you think its something that could be useful for me - how it would work, what I would need to do to set it up for our mail accounts, and how it fits in with my wi-fi Smartphone, and Active Sync etc.

Or is this totally not the right thing for me?

Any help or ideas would be greatly appreciated! Paul, you know loads about this I know - so any comments would be great.

Cheers folks...

Edited February 23, 2006 by shadamehr

[Guest shadamehr]

^ BUMP

Anyone? Or have I posted in the wrong place/forum thread?

[Guest jenya]

Email 1and1 and find out what spam solutions they offer for email hosting. What kind of email forwarding do you do from your other email accounts? Proxy or it actually just forwards it as a rule?

The major concern is that your 1and1 account will not know whats actually spam or what isnt because they will be coming from trusted domains (your other email accounts).

If you own the other domains that you have email on, you can transfer them all to your 1and1 account, so that way it could clean up the spam a little more.

Your desktop spam solution is good, but the problem with that would be that you are pulling messages straight from the server, so as soon as a message arrives in outlook it would theoretically be pulled by your smartphone device. Now more realistically wireless activesync has a little more delay since its not actually push technology. So your solution could work as long as you have your computer up and running with outlook open with a mapi connection or imap connection to the 1and1 exchange mailbox. So when the message arrives in outlook and your desktop spam cleaner will clean out the message before activesync will pick up that you have a message.

Hope that makes sense...

[Guest Paul [MVP]]

Sorry, just seen this topic!

Exchange would give you one place online where you store your mail, contacts, calendar, notes, tasks etc. etc.

You could then sync via WiFi or GPRS direct from your phone to get Mail, Contacts and Calendar and Tasks (assuming WM5).

You could also use RPC over HTTP to connect Outlook up and have everything on your server synced to your local client, and as soon as new mail arrives, it pops in your inbox - no more send and receive.

You could use OWA - Outlook Web Access - to access all your Exchange data when on the move, no longer just mail, but your contacts, calendar, tasks etc. too.

When AKU2 becomes available, yes, you can get push email.

With regards to spam, it depends what 1and1 are using. If they are using something nice like 'ihatespam' server side with some good rules, then you're set.

Finally, although you will be exchange'd, Exchange also supports POP3 / SMTP / IMAP etc. should you need it.

Phew, that useful? :)

P

PS re: the spam situation, I probably used to get a 100 spam to every 1 real mail (at best!), but I now get virtually no spam, and NEVER lose legitimate mails :D What's more, because the spam is filtered within the Exchange server, I can happily receive mail on my phone safe in the knowledge i'm not wasting money downloading spam!

[Guest Paul [MVP]]

Incidentally, let us know how good 1and1 is, and how you got the 3.99 deal :)

P

[Guest Paul [MVP]]

Beware, my wife and I both have accounts on the same Exchange server, and she can book things in my diary.

Actually, quite useful with a memory like mine :)

P

[Guest Paul [MVP]]

Nice Exchange feature, server side rules... direct mails off to seperate folders at server side, rather than your client having to be online to do it.

P

[Guest shadamehr]

Thanks for all that folks.

Lots to digest there.

Phew.

Don't suppose I can come back to the question I was curious about...

Will I only need ONE Exchange virtual hosting account, to cover the Email scenarios I listed at the start - i.e. mine and my partners mail, which are multiple domain names we own, that employ web forwarding to send to two real email hosting accounts...

[Guest Paul [MVP]]

Based on what I THINK you're trying to do... :)

You could each have your various domains redirect to your 1and1 accounts (I guess you're going to get 1 each?).

They way it'll probably work is you'll choose a domain name that will really belong to the 1and1 account (e.g. blah.com) so *@blah.com becomes your 1and1 address, and everything else redirects there.

With regards to her mail pinging over to you, you could accomplish that very easy, and in a more efficient server side manner to how you are doing it now, with an Exchange server side rule - job done.

One thing that might be odd is the outgoing mail address. You say you are using lots of domains, the outgoing mail address in Exchange will be shown as what Exchange has as your real address (e.g. [email protected]), as far as I am aware.

You don't seem to have the simplest of mail setups :D

P

[Guest awarner [MVP]]

The only downside I have with Exchange is that emails I send to compuserv and aol never get through, not even to the junk mail folder.

Quite a few other people end up having to look through their junk mail folders to get emails I send.

[Guest Paul [MVP]]

That's not Exchange, that's something AOL or Compuserve are doing, probably based on the IP of the sending server.

P

[Guest awarner [MVP]]

Yep but it's something to think about and being aware of when setting up the account.

[Guest Paul [MVP]]

AOL / Compuserve are a PITA... basically if one person clicks the 'this is spam' button in AOL in response to a mail sent from your server, blam, you're blacklisted... which is what's happened to my server.

Annoying...

P

[Guest skisteven1]

Can exchange not be set up to send from multiple addresses, just like outlook? How does one set up outlook on the local computer to sync with exchange? And when I do, will all my contacts/calander be uploaded?

[Guest Paul [MVP]]

No, not through Exchange itself you can't send from multiple addresses to my knowledge (I am occasionally wrong tho) :)

When you set up your RPC-HTTP connection to the Exchange server, all your contacts / calendar etc can be dragged from your 'Personal Folders' to the Exchange account to copy them into Exchange.

Shadamehr still hasn't told us how he got his 3.99 deal.

I'm interested to know if 1and1 have any Spam Filtering too... but too lazy to mail them myself :D

P

[Guest shadamehr]

I'm an existing 1 and 1 customer, and I get all sorts of Email Offers from them from time to time. The latest being this for £3.99 for twelve months instead of £5.99