Newbie Question... What is push email?

[IdeaDirect]

Hello,
Just got my Cingular 8125 as I have a need to check email on the road. I will be using wifi for connectivity to the internet and hopefully to check email.

I'm very new to this and don't understand the concept of email to smartphones. I keep coming across the term push email when researching upgraded roms. I think I want it but I'm not sure what it is. I'm assuming it allows my phone to just get email without having to connect to GPRS or wifi. Sort of like text messages. But really I have no clue and don't know if I need exchange server or not.

Here is what I am looking for... I have about 5 different POP3 accounts for my own domain names. I would like to be able to check these 5 accounts from my phone. I would also like to check my gmail account. I did find some instructions for this on these forums. Ideally, they would just go to the phone as they arrive. Another option would be for me to manually check email occassionally throughout the day through GPRS or Wifi. Would I be able to receive a phone call if I'm downloading emails?

These email accounts are from my websites on shared servers with a hosting provider. I do not have an Exchange Server. Looked into a company called web2email but not sure if I need that either.

Basically, what is the best solution for me to get my emails in a quick and reliable manner. Also, if anyone has any advice on syncing with Outlook that would be great... for instance, if I check email with my phone, is it removed from the server so when I check on my laptop it will show no emails? Then when I sync, will the phone emails be added to my laptop? Vice versa?

Appreciate any advice you might have. I tried to search and couldn't really find anything. If you would rather post a link to another thread or site tutorial that would be fine as well.

[meschle]

Yes i think you guessed right, push email is email that is sent to your device as soon as it arrives to your email account, but you will need a push email account and your gprs will need to be on continously. Some have reported higher costs with push email as it has a higher data use the ordinary pop email. Choice is yours!
When you check emails with your phone, the email stays on the server, and you can set your laptop to do likewise under your pop email account settings.

[IdeaDirect]

I plan on getting an unlimited plan (either medianet or dataplan) so I don't think it would be a problem for GPRS to always stay on.

I read something about some setting that will default to wifi if available.

Sounds like this "push email" is exactly what I was looking for. And to think I almost got a Blackberry.

Thanks again.

[GliTCH82]

The push e-mail system on Microsoft Windows Mobile devices requires an active cellular data connection. The device at periodic intervals issues a "heartbeat" to an Exchange server (belong to either your company, yourself, or an e-mail provider). The Exchange server checks the account, sees if you have new mail, and then pushes it back onto the device.

The battery drain is minimal compared to setting up Pocket Outlook to check for messages every X minutes, but it is slightly more than a true push system such as RIM's Blackberry devices. This is because RIM uses true push e-mail, where the network wakes up your device when you receive a new e-mail.

There's a free e-mail provider out there that supports Microsoft Exchange and Direct Push with ActiveSync. Check out the Mail2Web live service, at:

http://live.mail2web.com/

[IdeaDirect]

The push e-mail system on Microsoft Windows Mobile devices requires an active cellular data connection. The device at periodic intervals issues a "heartbeat" to an Exchange server (belong to either your company, yourself, or an e-mail provider). The Exchange server checks the account, sees if you have new mail, and then pushes it back onto the device.

The battery drain is minimal compared to setting up Pocket Outlook to check for messages every X minutes, but it is slightly more than a true push system such as RIM's Blackberry devices. This is because RIM uses true push e-mail, where the network wakes up your device when you receive a new e-mail.

There's a free e-mail provider out there that supports Microsoft Exchange and Direct Push with ActiveSync. Check out the Mail2Web live service, at:

http://live.mail2web.com/

So it sounds like I will need an exchange server which I don't have. I just have a standard POP3 account with my site hosting...
I like the push idea and will checkout mail2web. I will email them some questions as their site is somewhat confusing for me. It says the free account does not support POP3. I'm pretty sure I would need that. Their business accounts will work but I'm not sure if the pricing per user would allow me to use all 5 email accounts. That said though, if the free version won't work for me the paid accounts are very reasonably priced.

[FreakinSyco]

So can someone post a easy walkthru to getting functioning push on a 8125?

[hdubli]

To anble Direct Push, you shd hv AKU2 ROm installed on yr device.Then u can very well use it...also you can visit www.mail2web.com for live mail..

[GliTCH82]

Well, when you use a provider like Mail2Web you don't need to setup your own Exchange server, they let you use theirs. And unfortunately, Mail2Web's free live service which lets you use Direct Push doesn't let you use POP3. However, their Outlook Mobile Access is a web based e-mail system that is absolutely great, it mimics Microsoft Outlook's interface and for all intents and purposes eliminates the need for you to use POP3 to check e-mail from your account. When you sign up with them, your e-mail address is johndoe@mail2web.com.

As you may have already noticed, for a fee you can upgrade to POP3 access and other e-mail solutions including using your own domain (such as johndoe@mycompany.com) but I have yet to find a need for this. I just forward all my e-mail accounts to my mail2Web account with one drawback: When people get my e-mail it says it's from johndoe@mail2web.com.

But with 1 GB of free storage, and a 10 MB (if i remember correctly) message limit and free Direct Push, I'm not one to complain. :)

[Dox]

So it sounds like I will need an exchange server which I don't have. I just have a standard POP3 account with my site hosting...

Some hosting sites (running on Linux usually) will run something like Procmail that allows you to set up filtering and forwarding rules. You might be able to get your hosting POP3 accounts to forward copies of new mail to your mail2web account.

Alternatively, you could poll the POP3 accounts from your PC at home, and have an Inbox rule that forwards relevant (ie non junk/spam) to your mail2web account. That just means having your email client running all the time to do the forwarding...

Final thought is, as you said, to set up Exchange at home, poll your POP accounts (which I believe you can do with the version of Exchange in the Small Business Server) and then set up Push with your own server.

Regards,
Dox

[IdeaDirect]

So it sounds like I will need an exchange server which I don't have. I just have a standard POP3 account with my site hosting...

Some hosting sites (running on Linux usually) will run something like Procmail that allows you to set up filtering and forwarding rules. You might be able to get your hosting POP3 accounts to forward copies of new mail to your mail2web account.

Alternatively, you could poll the POP3 accounts from your PC at home, and have an Inbox rule that forwards relevant (ie non junk/spam) to your mail2web account. That just means having your email client running all the time to do the forwarding...

Final thought is, as you said, to set up Exchange at home, poll your POP accounts (which I believe you can do with the version of Exchange in the Small Business Server) and then set up Push with your own server.

Regards,
Dox

Good suggestions. Yes, I can set up all sorts of forwards on my hosting server but I like keeping things separate as they are all different businesses. I like to reply from the different emails as well. I also don't want to rely on my home email client and setting up an Exchange server seems complicated (to someone that didn't even know what push email was :wink: )

It does seem that the paid version at web2email will do the trick. It is only a couple bucks a month. I need to see if I can have multiple pop3 accounts though. I don't mind paying a few bucks each month for this service as it is quite important to me. It is the primary reason I got this phone.