I decided to make this a post of its own since the responses do not seem to be clearing the air. Ok, let me state it again in reference to FastMail and Hotmail: Hotmail does NOT provide SMTP. If it did, someone would already have come up with a response to Robert’s demand to tell him how to configure Hotmail in Pegasus Mail. What Hotmail does is simply integrate with OE or OL, precisely because they are Microsoft products, using Microsoft’s proprietary protocol, and thus in short puts an image of your Hotmail web account in OE and so when you send your mail it is sent through Hotmail. Netscape’s browser uses similar methods to integrate Netscape Mail to their email software. FastMail does NOT give you access to their SMTP server if you have a free account, and it is an excellent detourent to spam-abuse. But, YOUR ISP DOES GIVE YOU ACCESS TO THEIR SMTP SERVER. And that server can be used to send mail from ANY email account configured in your email client, be it OE or anything else. And that won’t have taglines either. Yes, your email will still show to be from the address you intended it to be from (not your ISP-provided email address), and your recepient will be able to reply to your FM address. Only a closer examination of your full headers will reveal that your ISP’s server was used to send the mail, so that if someone is trying to use FM for spamming, a spam report will go to the ISP, and thus spare FM the pain to deal with abuse by a free account. I say this again, it is a very sound anti-spam tactic.
Yes, Hotmail should be better with their Microsoft backing, but as always, the fact is, it is NOT.
Ok, now that I’ve cleared that up, let me say that FastMail is the overall best email service I’ve ever encountered. By overall, I mean their generous space allocation, excellent features, unbelievable support through their forum and email. Their business strategies make a lot of sense, so I can tell you that they are here to stay. I could say more and go on and on, but it’s all been said quite well by Robert (korax1214) and Jinu (injinuity); please read their posts.
Edited: ’Pegasus’ to ’Pegasus Mail’