Outlook allows you to control a number of important settings relating to your e-mail, including setting the frequency of polling the servers for e-mail and where to store the messages.
Polling for E-mail
One of the more important settings in Outlook is the frequency with which you receive e-mail from the server. Ideally, most people want this interval to be as short as possible. However, setting this interval too short could potentially result in receiving the same message multiple times. As well, if too many e-mail users are using a short time interval, the e-mail servers will become very busy, resulting in poor performance for everyone. Consequently, we suggest that you set this interval to 10 minutes and use the manual Send/Receive button when you need to check for a new message immediately. To change these settings in Outlook:
Step 1
From the main Outlook menu, select Options from the Tools menu.
Step 2
Choose the Mail Setup tab and click the Send/Receive button.
Step 3
From the Send/Receive group set your times for All Accounts and Offline to 10 minutes.
Click Close and OK to save your settings.
Warning! Should you choose an interval shorter than 5 minutes, the mail servers will automatically send you a system generated warning message to this effect once every hour until you change your settings.
Location of Messages
With Outlook you can choose where you would like your messages to reside, which can either be on the mail server, on your local machine or a combination of both. However, before deciding where to store your mail, consider the following two scenarios and then pick the one which most closely matches how you work:
- You frequently need access to your e-mail from different locations such as work, home, or on the road, and you are not using a laptop that you take with you everywhere you go.
- You access your e-mail from one computer only: this can be either a desktop computer or a laptop which you take with you everywhere you go.
If your work style most closely matches scenario 1 then you should consider storing your mail on the mail server and use a combination of web mail and Outlook to access your mail. With this option, you will have to be more diligent in cleaning up your messages, as your mail limits will be reached sooner than if you store the mail on your computer.
If your work style most closely matches scenario 2 then you should consider storing all your mail on your local computer. With this option you will only be able to access older mail using that computer, although you can get to newly received messages using web mail as long as it has not been downloaded to your computer.
To change the options for message storage location please do the following:
Step 1
From the main Outlook menu, select Email Accounts… from the Tools menu.
Step 2
Choose View or Change existing e-mail accounts and click the Next > button.
Step 3
Select the e-mail account you wish to change by either double clicking it or by selecting it and clicking theChange… button.
Step 4
From the E-mail Accounts list choose More Settings…
Step 5
In the Internet E-mail Settings dialog, choose the Advanced tab. Set the options under based on your scenario. For example, check Leave a copy of messages on the server if your work matches scenario 1 and uncheck this option if your work style matches scenario 2. If you opt to leave a copy on the server, you can further choose the option for removing the messages on the server. Caorda stongly suggests you do so as your mailbox could fill up otherwise. In addition to these option you may also be subject to Caorda’s e-mail polices.
Step 6
Click OK, Next > and Finish to save your changes.