Help – Need to replace email software – recommendations?

[hugglymugly]

Briefly: desktop seemingly on its last legs, so need to purchase new. Current O/S is XP, current mail/news software is Turnpike. New O/S will be W7, which Turnpike won't work on without a lot of faffing about. And anyway it's time to move on as Turnpike is no longer supported.

Turnpike was only installed once (back when it was on several floppy disks) - every transfer to a new computer was done by copying the data (including all settings) and running the installer over the top, so I'm actually a newbie even though I've been using the internet since Hector was a pup.

I need mail software that will handle multiple email addresses, in the way that Turnpike does. I'm with Plusnet, so I can have email addresses such as "[email protected]", "[email protected]", etc. What currently happens is that Turnpike connects to Plusnet's mail server and downloads all emails with "@mysubdomain.plus.com" in the address, irrespective of what's before the @.

I've looked at the installation/setup instructions, including those on Plusnet's site, for other email packages, but I can't figure out how to reproduce how Turnpike works. The first step always seems to be to set up an email account (the example given is "[email protected]") - but that's not what I want.

I don't know whether I'm completely missing the obvious - but there must be Mumsnetters who run systems where all emails addressed to "whoever"@organisation.com get downloaded, in which case could you tell me what software you use?

I'm guessing your PlusNet setup is a catchall email address, where all the email goes to the same mailbox, so all you need to do is figure out the mailbox address and download from that. All the information you need should be in your Turnpike settings. Just duplicate those in Thunderbird, or whatever mail client you choose and you should be OK.

I did this about two years ago, I moved from Turnpike to MS Outlook 2007.
Outlook is rather nice in the way it integrates one?s contacts, calendar, task list and emails.
Outlook can certainly handle "whoever"@organisation.com with ?rules? (that work, well, most of the time) to distribute emails to various folders.
BUT 1) it was very, very fiddly to transfer the emails/address book across ? good luck mate.
and 2) I really, really miss Turnpike?s powerful email ?rules? to distribute / discard etc.
The ?email rules? in Outlook are just NOT the same. I wonder if the latest version of Outlook is any better.
I have no experience of any other email program
Windows 7 though, is great.

Turnpike - wow, kudos to you, that is really retro stuff - it's a bit like asking "my current car is a Ford Model T and I can't work out which new car to buy because I've looked at the instruction manuals and I can't see where the starting handle goes in any of them"!

Any email client will do what you want. Microsoft Live Mail is free and works fine, you could look at Mozilla Thunderbird to compare.

Thanks for the suggestions. I've probably been over-thinking the whole issue, partly because it's such a pain to also have to start afresh with a new computer, e.g. which of the umpteen programs I've got on the current PC do I really need on the new one.

This morning, just as an exercise, I installed Gravity (newsreader) on my laptop, on the basis that if it all went pear-shaped it would be no great loss. The first step was much the same in the mail packages I've looked at, but I went ahead anyway and that's worked quite well.

I'll bit the bullet and try out Outlook/Thunderbird/MS Mail - I can get access to emails via webmail in the meantime. But I'll have to get everything I need from the poorly computer first (backup of data done yesterday), before it fails completely (forced shutdown yesterday, not connecting to the router today).

MrAnchovy - I've been using Turnpike since 1996, so it is getting a bit old, like me.

I personally use Thunderbird, it's pretty user friendly and the support base is there from their own forums etc :)

I rather miss Turnpike, I was using it from the early/mid 90's and it was clear, logical and the 'rules' were understandable.