Setting Up Your E-Mail Accounts

Before you can use Outlook to send and receive e-mail, you must set up your e-mail account. You can have more than one account—you’ll follow the same steps for each one. There are two parts to this.

First, your account must be set up on the server or at your ISP. This is not done in Outlook. If your account is at your workplace, it will likely have been set up by an IT person and he or she will have provided you with the required information such as your e-mail address and password. If you are setting up a home or small business account, you may be doing this yourself. The details depend on your ISP, so I cannot provide instructions, but as part of the process you will either specify or be given your e-mail address and password.

Second, you must set up your account in Outlook. This process provides Outlook with the information, such as your e-mail address and password, that it needs to connect to your e-mail server and send and receive messages. If you are at work, you may be lucky enough to have your IT guru set up Outlook for you, in which case you can skip this section. If you must do it yourself, the minimum information you need is your e-mail address and your password. You may also need to know the addresses for your organization’s or ISP’s e-mail server. The URL looks much like a Web page address and will be something like mail.hosting.com. Some mail accounts require two addresses, one for incoming mail and another for outgoing mail.

Free Hotmail Accounts and Outlook As of this writing, you cannot use Outlook to connect to a free Hotmail account—you must have one of its subscription accounts. You will have to access your free Hotmail account using your Web browser, as usual.

Outlook supports several different kinds of e-mail accounts including a Microsoft Exchange Server account. The account setup process differs depending on whether you have an Exchange account, an HTTP account such as Hotmail or MSN, or one of the other supported account types (POP and IMAP). All these procedures are covered in the following sections.

Automatic e-mail account setup

Outlook can automatically configure some e-mail accounts. This works for some but not all POP, IMAP, Exchange Server, or HTTP accounts. To use the automated e-mail account setup feature, you need to have your e-mail address and your password. Then, here are the steps to follow:

1.	From the menu, choose Tools Account Settings to display the Account Settings dialog box. Make sure that the E-Mail tab is selected, as shown in Figure 27-1. If any e-mail accounts are already set up, they will be listed here. If you’re just getting started, the list will be blank. Figure 27-1. The Account Settings dialog box. [View full size image]
2.	Click the New button to display the Add New E-Mail Account dialog box (Figure 27-2). Make sure that the Microsoft Exchange Server, POP3, IMAP, or HTTP option is selected; then click Next. Figure 27-2. The Add New E-Mail Account dialog box. [View full size image]
3.	The next dialog box, shown in Figure 27-3, asks for three pieces of information: Your name Your e-mail address Your password Figure 27-3. Entering your name, e-mail address, and password during e-mail account setup. [View full size image]
4.	After you enter the information, click Next. Outlook will try to connect to your e-mail server and set up the account.

In Step 3 in the preceding list, you have the option of proceeding with manual account setup by selecting the Manually Configure Server Settings or Additional Server Types option and clicking Next. Manual e-mail account setup is described for the various account types later in this chapter.

E-Mail Terminology All these acronyms can be confusing! POP stands for Post Office Protocol, a technology for receiving e-mail. You’ll also see POP3 used; they mean the same thing. IMAP is Internet Mail Access Protocol, another incoming mail technology. HTTP stands for Hypertext Transfer Protocol, which in addition to being a central technology for the Web is also used by some mail systems. SMTP is Simple Mail Transfer Protocol, the almost universally used technology for sending e-mail.

If you are continuing with automatic account setup, Outlook will attempt to connect to your e-mail server and set up the account. In most cases this will work just as it is supposed to. The setup process will finish, the new account will be listed in the e-mail accounts list, and you’ll be able to start sending and receiving messages. However, this automated process does not always work. You may encounter one of the following situations:

• Outlook tells you that it cannot establish an encrypted connection to the server and offers to try again using an unencrypted connection. Click next to proceed. The process will either complete properly or you’ll encounter one of the other conditions in this list.

• Outlook cannot establish a connection to your account and asks you to verify the spelling of your e-mail address. Make any needed corrections and click Next to try again. The process will either complete properly or you’ll encounter the final condition in this list.

• If the preceding steps fail, Outlook will require that you manually configure the server settings. This option will be automatically selected in the Add New E-Mail Account dialog box. Click Next to continue. The manual account setup steps differ for the various account types and are covered in the following sections.

Manual e-mail account setup (POP and IMAP)

If automatic account setup does not work for your POP or IMAP account, you will have to perform the setup it manually. It’s a bit more involved but nothing to be afraid of. You need some information in addition to your e-mail address and password. This information should be available from your ISP or your IT person:

• The addresses of your incoming mail server and outgoing mail server. These may be the same but are usually different. For POP incoming mail servers, the address usually looks something like pop.example.com. For outgoing mail servers, it may look like mail.example.com or smtp.example.com. Your ISP will provide the correct information to enter.

• The username and password for your account login.

When you have this information, you are ready to begin. The first dialog box in the manual account setup process is shown in Figure 27-4. You will arrive at this dialog box if automatic setup failed or if you explicitly selected manual account setup. Both of these are explained in the previous section, “Automatic e-mail account setup.”

Here are the steps to follow:

1.	Select the Internet E-Mail option.
2.	Click Next to display the dialog box shown in Figure 27-5. Enter all the requested information in the corresponding boxes and be sure to select the type of e-mail server from the Account Type list. The Remember Password option and Require Logon using Secure Password Authentication option are explained later in this chapter. Most people should leave these at their default settings. The More Settings button is also explained later in this chapter. Figure 27-5. Entering required information for manual POP or IMAP e-mail account setup. [View full size image]
3.	After you have entered all the information, click the Test Account Settings button. If the test works, click Next and then Finish to complete the account setup. If the test does not work, please refer to the next section (“If your account settings don’t work”) for steps to resolve the problem.

Two options are available in the Add New E-Mail Account dialog box. If you select the Remember Password option, Outlook will be able to automatically log on to your e-mail account as needed. Otherwise, you will be prompted for the password each time.

Secure Password Authentication, or SPA, is an additional level of security that some mail servers have implemented. If your server requires this, you should have been told and given any additional credentials required for login.

If your account settings don’t work

It’s not uncommon for e-mail account settings to not work at first. When you click the test Account Settings button, Outlook tries to log onto your incoming mail server and send a test message via your outgoing mail server. One or both of these tests may fail, and the results shown in the Test Account Settings dialog box (shown in Figure 27-6, which depicts a failed test) will tell you the results. Note also that this dialog box has an Errors tab, shown in Figure 27-7. The information on this tab may give you a clue as to where the problem lies. For example, if the problem is reported as The Server Rejected Your Login, the problem almost surely lies with the username or password that you entered.

The most common cause of problems is simply mistyping some of the information required in the account setup dialog box. Everything must be 100 percent correct!

If the test failed in the outgoing mail server part, it most likely means that your outgoing mail server requires authentication. Setting this option is examined in the following section.

More account settings

The E-Mail Account Setup Dialog box, shown in Figure 27-5, has a button labeled More Settings. You may not need to make any changes here, but if you do, you can refer to this section for the details.

Clicking the More Settings button brings up the Internet E-Mail Settings dialog box. This dialog box has four tabs for POP and IMAP accounts and a fifth for IMAP accounts only. The next sections look at these in turn.

General

The General Tab, shown in Figure 27-8, has these three entries:

• Mail Account: This is the name Outlook uses to refer to the account, for example in the account list. The default is your e-mail address but you can change it to anything you like, such as Work E-Mail or Yahoo Account.

• Organization: If you enter your organization name here, it will be included in the headers of all e-mail messages you send. Recipients normally do not see these headers, and Outlook does not make use of this information in any way. Other e-mail programs may, however.

• Reply E-Mail: When recipients receive an e-mail from you and reply by clicking the Reply button in their e-mail program, their reply message is sent to this address. By default, it is the e-mail address associated with the current e-mail account, but if you have more than one e-mail account, you can enter another address here.

Outgoing Server

The Outgoing Server tab, shown in Figure 27-9, lets you specify authentication—that is, logon—settings for your outgoing mail server. By default, this option is turned off because most outgoing mail servers do not require authentication. If yours does, select the My Outgoing Server (SMTP) Requires Authentication box and then select other options and enter information as follows:

• Use Same Settings As My Incoming Mail server: Outlook will log on to your outgoing mail server using the same username and password that you specified for your incoming mail server. This is the most commonly used setting.

• Log On Using: Select this option if your outgoing server requires its own logon. Then enter your username and password in the corresponding fields. The Remember password option and the Require Secure Password Authentication (SPA) options work the same as was described for them in the previous section, “Manual e-mail account setup.”

• Log On to Incoming Mail Server before Sending Mail: Select this option only if your incoming mail server is the same as your outgoing mail server. You will know that this is the case when you are given the same address for both servers and enter this address for both during account setup.

Connection

The Connection tab, shown in Figure 27-10, lets you specify details of how Outlook connects to your e-mail server. To set these options, you need to know how your computer is connected to the Internet. If you are at work, you almost surely connect via a local area network (LAN). If you are at home and have a cable modem or DSL connection, including wireless connections, this is also a LAN. A dial-up or phone line connection is an older connection technology that is still in use by many people.

If you are connected via a LAN, select the Connect Using My Local Area Network (LAN) option. If you select this option, you can also select the Connect Via Modem When Outlook Is Offline option. Doing so causes Outlook to use a dialup connection (assuming that one is available) to connect when the LAN is not available.

If you connect via a modem (phone line), select the Connect Using My Phone Line option. You may already have a dial-up connection defined in Windows. If not, you must define one before you can use Outlook for e-mail. Defining a dial-up network connection is a process that is part of the Windows operating system, not Outlook, and is beyond the scope of this book. Please refer to Windows online help for more information. If you select this option, you then must select the defined dial-up connection that you want to use in the Modem section of the dialog box. You can use the Add button to add a new dial-up connection and the Properties button to examine and modify the properties of an existing connection.

Advanced

The Advanced tab contains options that most people will never need to change. You may not be “most people,” however, so I explain these settings here. Note that the options available on this tab differ slightly for POP and IMAP accounts, as shown in Figures 27-11 and 27-12, respectively.

The advanced settings that are common to both POP and IMAP accounts are the following:

• Server Port Numbers, Incoming server: The default values are 110 for POP servers and 143 for IMAP servers. It’s rare for a server to be set up on different ports, but if yours is, you can enter the correct port numbers here.

• Server Port Numbers, Outgoing Server: Regardless of whether your incoming server is POP or IMAP, your outgoing server is SMTP and the default port number is 25. Do not change this unless you know that your outgoing mail server uses a different port—a rare occurrence.

• This Server Requires an Encrypted Connection (SSL): Turn this option on for the incoming or outgoing mail server, or both, if required.

• Server Timeouts: This is the amount of time that Outlook will wait for the mail server to respond when retrieving or sending e-mail. The default setting of 1 minute works fine in most cases. If you find Outlook timing out, it probably means that you are working over a slow connection or that your server is often busy. Try a longer timeout setting to resolve this problem.

If you are working with a POP account, you have several settings available that control how Outlook handles messages on the server:

• Leave a Copy of Messages on the Server: By default, messages that you have received are removed from the server as soon as they are downloaded to Outlook. Turn this option on if you want Outlook to leave the messages on the server after download. This can be useful if you want to later retrieve your messages from another computer.

• Remove from Server after . . . Days: Specifies how long messages are to be retained on the server after they have been downloaded.

• Remove from Server when Deleted from “Deleted Items”: A message is retained on the server until you permanently delete it in Outlook.

If you are working with an IMAP account, there is one unique option, Root Folder Path, that specifies the root folder of the mailbox. Normally you leave this blank and Outlook uses the default root folder on the server. If you need to specify a different root folder, enter it here.

Folders

The Folders tab is available in the Internet E-Mail Settings dialog box only for IMAP accounts. It lets you specify whether copies of sent mail should be stored in the default Sent Items folder or somewhere else. If you choose the latter option, you can select the folder to use or create a new folder.

Manual e-mail account setup (Exchange server)

If automatic account setup does not work for your Exchange account, you must exit Outlook and set up the account through the Windows Control Panel. Although some of the dialog boxes look the same, you cannot set up an Exchange account manually while Outlook is running. To complete this setup, you need to know the address of your Exchange server (or its NETBIOS name), the username that has been set up for you, and your password.

Downloading an Exchange Profile Some Exchange account providers give you the option of downloading an Exchange profile file to your computer. When you run this file, it sets up the Exchange profile for you. If available, this is an easy and error-free way to set up an Exchange profile.

These are the steps to set up an Exchange account:

1.	Make sure that Outlook is not running.
2.	Select Control Panel from the Windows Start menu.
3.	Double-click the Mail icon to display the Mail Setup dialog box.
4.	Click the E-Mail Accounts button to open the Account Settings dialog box. This is the same dialog box that you see when setting up accounts from within Outlook (shown earlier in Figure 27-2).
5.	On the E-Mail tab, click the New button to display the Add New E-Mail Account dialog box.
6.	Make sure that the Microsoft Exchange, POP3, IMAP, or HTTP option is selected and then click Next.
7.	In the next dialog box, select the Manually Configure Server Settings option and then click Next.
8.	In the next dialog box, select the Microsoft Exchange option and then click Next.
9.	In the next dialog box, shown in Figure 27-13, enter your Exchange server address and username. Figure 27-13. Entering information about your Exchange server and username. [View full size image]
10.	If a dialog box appears asking whether you want to continue, click OK.
11.	Click Finish.

After setting up your account, you can start Outlook. You will be prompted for the Exchange account password. If the connection is established, Outlook displays Connected to Microsoft Exchange at the right end of the status bar (which is at the bottom of the Outlook window).

Manual e-mail account setup (HTTP)

You have an HTTP mail account if you have signed up for e-mail with the MSN Premium, MSN Hotmail Plus, and Microsoft Office Outlook Live subscription service. Other e-mail providers may also have HTTP accounts that are compatible with Outlook. If so, they will have provided you with the information you need to set up the account when you signed up.

Only One Exchange Account Although Outlook can support multiple e-mail accounts, you can have only one Exchange account set up.

HTTP mail accounts are designed primarily for Web use—that is, you will use a browser such as Internet Explorer to log on to your e-mail account and read and send messages. However, it can be useful to set up an Outlook account, too, so that you can download and read mail in Outlook and use the program’s various features to organize your messages. Be aware that not all HTTP e-mail accounts are compatible with Outlook.

To set up your HTTP e-mail account in Outlook, you need your e-mail address and password. If you are setting up an HTTP account that is not Hotmail or MSN, you will also need to know the address (URL) of the mail server and your username. Then, follow these steps:

1.	Select the Manually Configure Server Settings option in the dialog box (refer to Figure 27-3) and then click Next.
2.	In the next dialog box that appears, make sure that the Internet E-Mail option is selected; then click Next.
3.	In the next dialog box that appears, which is shown in Figure 27-14, enter your name, e-mail address, username, and password. Make sure that HTTP is selected in the Account Type list. Figure 27-14. Entering information for manual HTTP mail account setup. [View full size image]
4.	Select Hotmail, MSN, or Other in the HTTP Service Provider list.
5.	If you selected Other in the previous step, enter the URL of your HTTP e-mail server in the provided box.
6.	Click Next to complete account setup.