Hotmail vs. Outlook

June 4, 2005 7:08 AM

Why is my Hotmail account not exporting to Ouitllok Express on my PC? It's an old account...

Actually, it's my girlfriend's PC. Hotmail announced that soon it will no longer allow Hotmail to be accessed by Outlook users, but older hotmail accounts would be "grandfathered" to allow users to continue using Outlook. Nevertheless, yesterday my GF's Outlook could no longer import from Hotmail. Googling hasn't helped.

I don't dare suspect that there could be a problem with these and many more fine Microsoft products!

posted by zaelic to computers & internet (7 comments total)

Are you asking about Outlook or Outlook Express? You say Express in the first paragraph, but Outlook in the rest. They are two completely different programs. Outlook Express is the free email client Microsoft bundled with older versions of IE. Outlook is the full-featured client that is part of Office, although it can be purchased separately.

My understanding is that Microsoft is (thankfully) in the process of getting rid of Outlook Express, which could be why it's no longer being supported by Hotmail. My copy of Outlook 2003 has no problems retrieving mail from Hotmail, so if she is in fact using Outlook Express, you might consider upgrading her to Outlook. If you don't want to pay for Outlook, there are tons of free email clients out there that are far more friendly and feature-rich than Outlook Express.
posted by robhuddles at 8:06 AM on June 4, 2005

Not an answer, but Hotmail seems to have also stopped exporting to Entourage (Mac, OS X)
posted by cushie at 8:51 AM on June 4, 2005

Also- make sure your password is 8 digits- if it is only 6 (which hotmail used to allow)- it may fail. You need to log on through a web browser to change it.
posted by cushie at 9:02 AM on June 4, 2005

How long has this been going on? I have been experiencing intermittent problems connecting to Hotmail through Entourage for the past few months, but it typically clears itself up after a few hours.

If she logs on through the web interface, and then tries connecting through OE, does that fix it? I know that at one point (and I assume still), you had to login to the web version every once in a while to keep the account active. This way they can make sure you're seeing at least some ads.

Also, I've heard about some accounts getting forced to reauthenticate because of reported spam or abuse problems. OE probably can't give you those prompts, so you need to login through the web.

If she quits OE, and then relaunches and tries to connect does that fix it? Recently I've found that helps in Entourage at least when I get an error message that an end of line was reached or something to that effect.
posted by willnot at 9:33 AM on June 4, 2005

I've had intermittent problems with outlook express and hotmail for a couple days now. (Many more failures than successes.) I think something is wrong with the hotmail servers.
posted by sexymofo at 9:37 AM on June 4, 2005

Are you using a personal firewall like Zone Alarm? I've noticed lately that my OE has problems with Hotmail too but if I turn off ZoneAlarm it doesn't. I think maybe Microsoft changed their port number. I'm going to clear everything out of ZoneAlarm and have it re-prompt me for connections.
posted by dgeiser13 at 1:17 PM on June 4, 2005

i prefer outlook express to outlook for some reason.
posted by sgt.serenity at 3:06 PM on June 5, 2005