This short tutorial will show you how to setup a fairly decent email client, so that you can download your emails onto your own computer. For your information, this uses the convention "POP" or "POP3" method of accessing emails. It means that your email messages will not remain on the server, but will instead remain on your own hard-drive. This can give you better flexibility and would enable you to do things like:
- setting up your own email rules that you can use to filter email messages.
- setting up your own 'From' addresses so that you can appear more official than when using a web based client
This will also enable you to avoid a great deal of advertizing and non-sense that is generally associated with web-based email clients.
The "downside" (or the "upside", depending on how you look at it) you will not be able to access your downloaded email from anywhere in the world. So there are advantages and disadvantages to setting up your own POP email client! :-)
We will be using Thunderbird. However, you could also use other email clients. Thunderbird is a good and free email client, developed by Mozilla.
1. Download Thunderbird.
2. Click on the downloaded file and install Thunderbird as per the on-screen instructions.
3. Choose standard setup when asked.
4. If you are setting up a new email client, choose "don't import anything".
5. Type your name when asked.
6. Put in your email address that you are setting up.
7. Enter the name of your incoming server. For example, mail.mydomain.com. (omit the last dot).
8. Enter the name of your outgoing server. This is the server that your internet service provider has provided you with. For example, smtphm.sympatico.ca or broadband.smtp.rogers.com (these are just examples; please consult your ISP).
9. Enter the incoming user name. This will normally be the full user name with the '@' plus the domain name. So, for example, myname@mydomain.com. (omit the last dot).
10. Enter the account name. This can be any name that you will use internally to recognize the account. For example, myname@mydomain.com. This will not be seen by outsiders or people you send emails to.
NOTE: You may need to change some port settings if your outgoing ISP requires a different port than port 25. The default is port 25 but others may use other ports, such as 587. Your outgoing server may also require authentication. Please check the outgoing server settings and your ISP.
You will be prompted for a password. This is your POP/POP3 password that you should have created (or received) when setting up your account.
