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More and more people seem to be thinking about changing from the older POP email standard to something more portable and easier to access. I’ve had a couple friends this summer ask me about getting off their cox.net or ATT DSL accounts. They are wanting email that is mobile and that updates and syncs across devices. They want something they can easily log into from the web while traveling. They want an interface that is easy to navigate with the ability to have their contacts and calendar all together.
Solution – Outlook.com Email! It handles all the above and even more, but that’s another article .
I’m going to show you two ways to move your cox.net mail over to Outlook.com email. Before you can move your mail, you’ll first need to get your new Outlook.com email set up. Just visit http://outlook.com and sign up.
Solution 1 to Move from Cox.net to Outlook.com – Forward
Once your Outlook.com account is set up, then you’ll need to log into your Cox webmail. When you’re logged into your account, you’ll see their utilitarian interface. Just click on the ‘Settings’ tab.
You’ll then see the screen below – click on ‘Forwarding’ and then
the box below will open up. Simply insert your new Outlook.com email address and then click one of the radio buttons. I chose to discard messages on the Cox server because I don’t want them sitting around in there for some you-know-what agency to peruse.
That’s it – you’re finished. I set up a test account and I forwarded several emails to it and they appeared in my Outlook.com mail box within a minute or so. I was impressed. Here’s a look at the Outlook.com interface – which one would you rather look at?
Solution 2-Add Your POP Account to Outlook.com
If you’d rather keep everything organized in Outlook.com, I’ve got a video here to show you how. It is very easy as Outlook.com takes care of getting all the settings right.
Outlook.com checks for POP mail accounts every 30 minutes according to this article – http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/windows/outlook/other-email-accounts , however, you can use the keyboard shortcut, M and that will refresh your mail.
In experimenting with this test account, it was much faster to set the forwarding feature in my Cox webmail than to set up the Outlook.com add-a-mail account feature. When I had a forwarding command set in Cox, I’d get the emails delivered almost instantly.
If you are thinking about ditching your POP email, give Outlook.com a try. It’s easy to log in, you get contacts, calendar and 7 GB of storage space with SkyDrive. You can add your Gmail, Yahoo mail (plus) and just about any other type of account and have your mail all in one place. Let me know what you think – please leave me a comment.