What alternatives are there to Outlook for email?

September 25, 2004 8:16 AM

Reborn Firefox user looking for e-mail advice. (mi)

I have gone off MS IE, switching to Firefox. It's now time to do the same for Microsoft Outlook, methinks, so I'm looking for a free mail program with tasks, calendar, contacts, etc. (basically, MS Outlook done good). Only one problem: I need to be able to migrate my almost 1000 contacts, more than 6000 e-mails etc. to the new program (with attachments, date stamps and everything). Hope me?

posted by NekulturnY to Computers & Internet (10 answers total)

Most email clients don't provide todo, calendar, or strong contact features, and most PIMs don't have useful email handling. Outlook is kind of a compromise between the two. If you want something decent, you'll probably be looking at two new pieces of software: a decent mail reader (Thunderbird's okay, but take your pick; most should be able to raid your .PST file for migration) and a PIM (I use text files, so don't ask me about modern PIMs).
posted by majick at 8:37 AM on September 25, 2004

I don't wish to sound snarky, but have you considered using Mozilla (browser, e-mail, address book, the whole schmear) rather than Firefox?
posted by SPrintF at 9:12 AM on September 25, 2004

Response by poster: I just switched from Mozilla to Firefox, which I like better. So two programs. No problem, but the question remains: which?
posted by NekulturnY at 9:22 AM on September 25, 2004

I switched from outlook to gmail for my mail, I believe there are e-mail/address book importers out there..

For scheduling I've stuck with outlook as it syncs with my smartphone.
posted by Mossy at 9:57 AM on September 25, 2004

As I understand it, you won't find One Program To Rule Them All.

You probably want Thunderbird for email and any of a few calendar add-ons for Firefox; I don't think there are any for Thunderbird.

real men use pine
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 9:58 AM on September 25, 2004

For calendaring, there's the Sunbird project.
posted by monju_bosatsu at 10:37 AM on September 25, 2004

When I ditched Outlook for Thunderbird, I installed Palm Desktop to take care of scheduling. It's free and works well without a PDA. Thunderbird handles my email and contacts.
posted by muckster at 12:25 PM on September 25, 2004

Thunderbird has a calender (it may be an extension, I don't remember) and Firefox 1.0PR checks your email.
posted by Grod at 1:53 PM on September 25, 2004

I just did the Outlook to Thunderbird switch (two days ago...) and I wish I had done it sooner....I don't do scheduling at home...but the Sunbird solution looks good...
posted by mattr at 3:46 AM on September 26, 2004

btw - nice user name....
posted by mattr at 3:47 AM on September 26, 2004