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http://www.getthunderbird.com/
Thunderbird is a free, extensible mail client software with excellent IMAP support.
See also POP vs. IMAP or Why I Use IMAP
http://luxsci.com/blog/head-to-head-battle-of-the-email-clients.html
https://support.mayfirst.org/wiki/speedup_thunderbird_imap
http://luxsci.com/blog/optimizing-mozilla-thunderbird.html
http://bleedingedge.com.au/blog/archives/2005/11/making_thunderbird_fly.html
See also Thunderbird Synchronization
http://enhancedlinux.com/2010/01/15/disable-thunderbird-3-bloat/
Thunderbird caches local copies of your message store in your Windows profile. If you have Roaming Profiles, this can negatively affect your login/logout times.
However, the local caching is a significant speed enhancer.
Instructions adapted from here:
http://kb.mozillazine.org/Moving_your_profile_folder_-_Thunderbird
These instructions will seem strange since there is no “move profile” or “register profile” button in the profile manager but it isn't a mistake. When you press the “Create Profile” button and then browse to your profiles location it does not do anything to your profile, it merely updates profiles.ini
to point to that profile so that Thunderbird can find and use that profile. You could do the same thing by editing profiles.ini
yourself but it is very easy to make a mistake doing that.
Use the Profile Manager to move your profile:
C:\Documents and Settings\username\Application Data\Thunderbird\Profiles\profile name.default
) to where you want to store it. (You can copy it anywhere, except the program directory.) I chose c:\Mail\profilename.default
-profilemanager
to the end in the “Run” field.If most of the folders for an account aren't visible and your inbox looks empty find the local directory setting at the bottom of the Tools → Account Settings → Server Settings page, and use the “Browse” button to update its location. Normally it points to a directory named after the mail server used by that account, unless you using a global inbox. In that case it points to the Local Folders directory in the profile.
Edit (Tools) → Account Settings → Synchronization and Storage
Delete cached files taking up space:
C:\Documents and Settings\<profile>\Application Data\Thunderbird\Profiles\<profile>\ImapMail\*