Email Client For Gmail

Can anyone recommend a good (Windows 10) email client that I can use to access my gmail including contacts ?

I dont like using the browser, I have Outlook configured, but that only syncs the email ... contacts & calendar do not sync.

I'd really like an Outlook-like client that allows me to manage & sync email, contacts & (nice but not critical) calendar

 

Mozilla Thunderbird
http://www.majorgeeks.com/files/details/mozilla_thunderbird_final.html

 

Thanks - I'll try that out this evening

A small bit of research suggests I may need an add on (gContactSync) to sync the contacts ... is that right?

 

support.mozilla.org has all the guides to using it.

 

I've used Thunderbird with Gmail for years, including in Win 10, and yes, you do need gContactSync to sync your contacts. Lightning, the calendar manager, is built in but I prefer to use Firefox for my calendar as it syncs so well. However the last few months, while TBird is still there should I want it, I've been using the Win 10 Mail and People apps and most of the time they suit me fine, simple apps that work really well. The only times I've needed TBird have been when I've moved a file in Mail and accidentally dropped it in the wrong folder. Mail ain't great at finding things.

 

Thanks - does Win10 People sync with Gmail contacts?

 

Yes, within seconds. Also with your phone.

 

"I've used Thunderbird with Gmail for years, including in Win 10, and yes, you do need gContactSync to sync your contacts. Lightning, the calendar manager, is built in but I prefer to use Firefox for my calendar as it syncs so well. However the last few months, while TBird is still there should I want it, I've been using the Win 10 Mail and People apps and most of the time they suit me fine, simple apps that work really well. The only times I've needed TBird have been when I've moved a file in Mail and accidentally dropped it in the wrong folder. Mail ain't great at finding things."

If wish I knew about the Firefox calendar before setting up Thunderbird a while back. T-bird is OK but...

 

I installed Thunderbird, but I hit a small problem ... I have a load of archived mails in a local .pst file, and I cant find a way to import that into TB. There is an article on this here - http://kb.mozillazine.org/Import_.pst_files, but it suggests the functionality broke after version 38, and suggested I try using an older version. Tried that but it failed to recognise Outlook 2016 as the default mail client.

I also looked into Win10 Mail, but that doesnt allow .pst import.

I guess I could work around by leaving my old email archive in Outlook, but its not ideal.

I should have posted this requirement (ability to import .pst) in my original question, my apologies

Anyway - am I screwed or does anyone have any ideas/suggestions?

 

If you were using POP3 with your original mail client, and had the settings to 'leave on server', you can simply re-download them again.

 

Thanks, but, unfortunately, I was using IMAP, and I deliberately stored as local .pst files as there are a number of years of email archives in there.

Oh well ... we cant have everything in this world.

Good luck on June 8th

 

Yes that's a pain.
June 8th should be fine, and at the very least we wont end up with a French Tony Blair! lol

 

I think I have a manual workaround:

1. Within Outlook copy (drag & drop) each folder that is within my PST up to my Gmail account
2. open Thunderbird & copy it down to my local folders there
3. In either TB or Outlook then it from my Gmail account.

Doing it one folder at a time and so far so good.

 

Sorry - bad typing, and cant find an edit button :

3. In either TB or Outlook then delete the folder from my Gmail account.

 

I had to do exactly that when we moved my wife's email from her ISP to Gmail. Worked a treat. I would have suggested it but your #11 completely threw me when you said it was IMAP. You can't store old IMAP emails in a .pst account.

 

Really?

I have both Oulook and TB setup to connect to Gmail using IMAP at the moment, and always move emails from my inbox to local folders. Now the original pst file was copied from a PC that had an Exchange Server connection not IMAP, but I am I have had no problem adding to the folders from my (IMAP) inbox

 

It's years since I've used Outlook and just wasn't sure what status a message has when moved from IMAP Inbox to a local folder in a .pst file. Is it still sync'd with the mail server? And if not, what happens at the server end, does it just get dropped? Because of these uncertainties I thought it better to leave you to it, and you duly solved it

 

Who knows - I may have broken it

Anything I do in Outlook on my gmail server folders (Inbox etc) seems to get reflected on the server; obvioously anything I do locally (in the separate pst) dos nto get reflected. If I move something from inbox to a local folder then it gets deleted from gmail server. It looks like similar behaviour happens with TB

You panicked me a bit, so I have kept a backup of the original pst, and can recover it if I really have screwed up

 

PS - WHat I have now just discovred is that if I delete or move a mail from my inbox on Outlook or TB, it still sits in the "All Mail" folder

If I move to POP3 will that resolve that issue? (I thought POP3 meant that the server remained unchanged when you move/delete emails in the client)

 

No, that sounds good - you haven't broken anything. If I'd thought it through a bit more I could and should have advised you. I trust Google not to lose my mail and haven't used local folders in years.

EDIT - just seen your #19 and thinking

 

Items in All Mail disappear after about six weeks. Not sure whether you can change that behaviour. POP3 would be a big step backward IMO.

 

Oh thats great - thanks

 

Don't know much about .pst, rarely used IMAP but do know a fair bit about POP3. If I recall correctly, moving things around on your local client (e.g. Thunderbird) doesn't move it at the server end. However, POP3 is fairly configurable if you get into the advanced settings, such as:

• choosing whether you want the emails deleted when you delete them from Thunderbird (or Outlook or whatever other client you use)
• do you want them to remain on the server or be deleted when you've 'popped' them to your email program.
  
• if you do want them to remain on the server
  • is that permanently unless you delete them
  • for a period of time after you downloaded the email and if so
    • choose how long for... (My rule of thumb has always been to think about how long I'm likely, on average, to want to consult recent emails and make sure they don't get deleted off the server before then. E.g. if I'm sending myself emails so I have a way of accessing information between home and somewhere else, I want the email to stay until I've been and come back, maybe just a few days and so I set for a week before deletion from server.)

I think most questions about what POP3 can do are answered just by getting into the Advanced settings.

Oh, and for someone choosing to use POP3, if you get a password error after setting up Thunderbird/whatever, the real problem might be that you haven't visited your email account in a browser and chosen to allow POP3 to be used. Yahoo accounts often trigger that with Thunderbird.