MaximumPC 2004 11

Despite the speed and convenience of Nextel’s i85s, we prefer

the Ericsson R380, with just one reservation—the Ericsson’s

steep price. It costs $600. For $300, we could buy a full-featured

cell phone and a Palm OS-based PDA. Freeing up a little more

space in our backpacks definitely isn’t worth an additional $300.

The smartphone category shows a lot of promise, but we have

yet to see anything even remotely close to perfection.

MOZILLA THUNDERBIRD

THE UPSHOT

NOVEMBER 2004 MA XIMUMPC 23

C

all us open-source lovin’ hippies, but we think

Thunderbird’s flexibility and power make it supe-

rior to Outlook Express, much like its web-browsing

brother Firefox has outpaced Internet Explorer. What’s more,

Thunderbird promises to continually improve. Outlook Express

has remained literally unchanged for several years now.

You’d survive alright if you refused to switch—O utlook

Express is a decent e-mail client that will serve your needs

well. But we’re here to tell you: Thunderbird is a worthy,

more powerful, and safer alternative. n

Expandability: Because Thunderbird

has a well-documented extension

standard, developers worldwide have

created add-ons for the app, which

are free for anyone to download and

use. With an array of extensions

including everything from an address-

book sidebar, to a dictionary look-up,

to mouse gestures, users are able

to customize their experience and

dramatically boost Thunderbird’s func-

tionality, giving it an easy victory over

OE. Winner: Thunderbird

Usability: The applications

have a similar look and feel

but Outlook Express pulls

out a win thanks to its

customizable toolbars and

the permanent presence

of the address book in the

main interface—two things

Thunderbird lacks. This is

surprising, given Mozilla’s

overarching emphasis on

accommodating users.

Winner: Outlook Express

Features: Thunderbird
isn’t exactly feature-
packed, but it has enough
nice touches to make it
more useful than Outlook
Express. Coolest by far
is the built-in beysian
filtering spam detec-
tor, which works with
an astonishing level of
accuracy. By default it
flags e-mails that it thinks
are spam and after a few
days begins automatically
moving them into a Junk
folder. You can mark any
e-mail as “junk” with one
click, and once you do, all
messages that match the
offender are automatically
banished. You can also
mark messages with a
wide array of tags such
as “personal” or “impor-
tant,” whereas Outlook
Express only has “nor-
mal,” “low,” and “high”
priority levels.
Winner: Thunderbird

Ease of migration:
Migrating from another e-
mail client to Thunderbird
is an easy process that’s
made even easier by the
fact that you can import
mail from Microsoft
programs as well as
Eudora. Outlook Express
primarily allows import-
ing from other Microsoft
programs, but doesn’t
let you export mail mes-
sages in non-Microsoft
data formats. The ease
with which Thunderbird
imports mail from an
existing client makes it
the clear winner.
Winner: Thunderbird

Security and privacy: Thunderbird

blocks remote images, like OE , in

order to keep your identity safe

from spammers. But Thunderbird

is a notch safer than OE because it

doesn’t use Microsoft’s proprietary

ActiveX controls. Even though

these controls are turned off by

default in Outlook Express , the fact

that they could be turned on is a

very bad thing.

Winner: Thunderbird