SubscribeWindows Live Mail Desktop Beta – what a mouthful!
Posted by stuart on June 24th 2006
I’ve just signed up for the beta of Windows Live Mail Desktop Beta – what a mouthful, I think it’ll be called WLMDB for now! (Do you remember how Microsoft slapped the ‘.Net’ moniker on every product they could find? Anyone else get the feeling that they are doing the same thing with the ‘Live’ name too?)
To be honest, I’m approaching this review with a lot of scepticism – I first wrote about this upcoming software many weeks ago after previewing some screenshots. The worst thing that stood out from these screenshots was the obtrusive adverts, but there is some good news – read on.
Installing the software is pain-free and offers no customisations apart from allowing you to choose whether to install shortcuts on the desktop.
On the first run, things get a bit more interesting. You’re prompted to enter your Passport ‘Live’ ID in a screen which is now looking familiar as it has the same ‘Live’ styling as the other new Live products. After this, however, we’re back to the old Outlook Express interface, and apart from the exterior interface, there’s a lot here to remind us that this is just a beefed-up version of the ancient Outlook Express.
You can set up as many email accounts as you want including your Live Mail / Hotmail account, as well as any number of POP3 or IMAP accounts. This means that you can also set up your Gmail account as can be seen in the following shots.
After I had set up my Gmail account in WLMDB, I was appropriately punished by the evil Microsoft gods watching me, as the processor usage shot up to 100% with the culprit being wlmail.exe. In fairness, this is still a beta product, and these are the joys of testing beta applications. Killing the process and restarting WLMDB put everything back to normal, and I didn’t experience this issue again during my testing.
WLMDB also has a built-in RSS reader which synchronizes your feeds with the Common Feeds List (CFL) which was first introduced with Internet Explorer 7 and is also featured in Windows Vista and Outlook 2007. This means that if you add a feed to WLMDB, it will automatically show up in other applications that utilise the CFL. Here is a screenshot of my feeds which I had previously synched into IE7.
You can also blog directly from WLMDB… BUT – only if you use Microsoft’s blogging platform MSN Spaces (or, soon to be Live Spaces??) This REALLY annoys me – I should be able to blog to any online blog service that supports open standards. This isn’t just Microsoft doing this though – Google is guilty of the same crime from within Picasa (more about this in a future post.)
Going back to the main feature of the application – sending and receiving emails. Composing a new email introduces some new features including a very cool, auto-complete popup window that displays matching addresses while you’re typing in the email recipients. There’s also a number of improvements to allow you to email photos as either attachments or inline with an option to change the thumbnail sizes on the fly. This is a neat feature that will be useful for lots of people who still email photos around.
I mentioned earlier that the advertising had changed tactic a bit and it is now a lot less intrusive. You now have a choice of whether you would like to see ugly, obtrusive, flashy, distracting banner-ads, or, discrete, relevant ads. Not really much of a choice is it, and quite honestly, I’m not sure why they’ve bothered leaving the banner-ads in there at all? The discrete ads are actually called ‘Active Search’ because they search the contents of your email and display ads that are relevant with the content. Google has been doing this for while now with Gmail and I don’t have a problem with it at all – as long as my emails aren’t surreptitiously being uploaded to a massive database in the sky.
WLMDB can also display traditional newsgroups which I haven’t used for ages. I used to religiously subscribe and post to several newsgroups in the past but have lost touch with the newsgroup world after discovering forums and mailing lists. Anyway, here’s a screenshot of the interface for you newsgroup-lovers out there.
That’s about all of the features I’ve found so far and overall I think it’s OK. Not great, or good, just OK. I personally won’t have a use for WLMDB – I use Gmail as my primary email account and use Live Messenger to notify me when I receive the occasional email or spam in my Hotmail account. Also, I wouldn’t use Gmail through the POP3 interface as it doesn’t allow me to apply labels to my messages which I’ve
Posted by stuart
Filed under Windows Live Mail Desktop
Tagged with gmail, microsoft, microsoft windows vista, office 2007, outlook 2007, rss, search, software, thunderbird, webmail, windows, Windows Live Mail, Windows Live Mail Desktop, Windows Live Messenger, windows mail, wlmdb
15 Comments
[...] I’ve just posted an in-depth review on the beta @ amanzi site on the new WLMDB (awful name) with lots of screenshots. Read on for more details…read more | digg story Tags: Posted by stuart Filed in General [...]
[...] beta @ amanzi � Windows Live Mail Desktop Beta – what a mouthful! I’ve just signed up for the beta of Windows Live Mail Desktop Beta – what a mouthful, I think it’ll be called WLMDB for now! (Do you remember how Microsoft slapped the ‘.Net’ moniker on every product they could find? Anyone else get the feeling th (tags: gmail microsoft windows vista office 2007 outlook rss search software thunderbird webmail Live Mail Desktop Messenger) Tags: Posted by stuart Filed in Links [...]
Hi, I’d love an invite so I can weigh up whether its GMail or WDLM for me once and for all. Send my invite to sayft@hotmail.com
Thx
Please Send me a link so i can join the LIVE MAIL DESKTOP BETA.
Thank you.
Eddie
Please Send me a link so i can join the LIVE MAIL DESKTOP BETA.
my email address: 7434600@gmail.com
Thank you.
Eddie
I don’t know if you are still beta testing, but I found one annoying thing about it. There is a new version of it and the only way I found out was to go to there posting about it (http://morethanmail.spaces.live.com/). They took away the ads and made the UI more interesting to say the least. It’s starting to go above the OK filing in my opinion. They also took the “Invite” portion away from it and made it a public download. Check it out if you are still doing the testing. You’d have to change this very informative site, but…change is the only constant.:)
where can i download windows live desktop beta i recieved an invotation and took up the offer only to find it was shit!!! the colors r plain my bf has a vers that is nicer but i dont know how to get it as his was in invo too can u help me?
[...] Previous beta @ amanzi review Tags: Windows Live Mail DesktopBookmark this:These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. [...]
How can i change Primary Account ?
Thx.
Sorry – since the follow-up review, I’ve now uninstalled WLMDB as I don’t need it. Best place to look for support is here: http://wlmdbsupport.spaces.live.com/
Cheers!
download window beta mail
Juani,
I too am searching for the old version of Beta (Sept.15 or so), the one following is really junk. It is filled with launch problems.
However, Desktop Beta changed its name, I’m told, to Mail Center download. I guess I’ll try it. I don’t think it could get worse.
I haven’t tested the new version yet, but I did post this updated review a few weeks back: http://beta.amanzi.co.nz/2006/10/14/updated-windows-live-mail-desktop-beta-review/
it’s great
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