Wow. I think Outlook is one of the shittiest pieces of software Microsoft has ever made. Lets see... it crashes all the time. It is dog slow. You shut it down and it doesn't really shut down.
The search is pathetic. This is huge. If you can't find your email, it's not very useful.
Organizing emails by folder isn't necessary if you have a powerful search facility. Gmail search is much faster than any outlook search and it actually gives you what you need. Manual folder organization is a waste of time.
Labels are useful with the rule wizard. And I have to say I find the rules on Gmail much nicer than Outlook. And unlike Outlook, you don't have to start up your client to run them.
You can sync your contacts, etc...Google has all kinds of sync softare (gry google-ing it).
You can access gmail from any phone that uses IMAP/POP (including blackberry).
You have 7 gigs of storage. Instead of the pathetic 100 meg that you usually see with corporate Exchange servers.
The spam filtering doesn't even compare. Google has mastered it.
You can hook gmail up to your own domain easily (google apps account).
And GMail is free.
I think you have it backwards. Gmail is the power user's email, outlook is for people who are stuck in the past.
I prefer GMail as well, but you're not making a very strong case for it. Outlook has its benefits and:
* The search has improved in Outlook 2007, plus there are 3rd party search tools and plugins (like Google Desktop, of course)
* Labels/Folders is not a big difference, and with a proper Exchange server set up, the Outlook rules do run on the server not just your client
* IMAP/POP is not the same as ActiveSync or Blackberry Server support. It's a big difference (Push vs Scheduled Pull) and is a dealbreaker for most Blackberry users.
* Gmail may give you 7 gigs, but Outlook/Exchange gives you as much as you have hard drive space for, and hard drives are awfully cheap these days. The fact that some corporations have crappy policies isn't Outlook's fault.
* GMail is free, but most people get Outlook with Office, which they were gonna buy anyway. Exchange server isn't free, but it's only a few grand. And, notably, it means you control and store all your own email, this makes GMail a dealbreaker for people for various security or legal reasons.
But yeah, the Outlook spam filtering sucks. There are plugins to make it better, but I still think GMail has the best anti-spam I've ever seen.
Maybe I have some magical copy of Outlook 2007. It's never crashed on me once. It's not speedy, by any means, but it stays loaded all the time, and once loaded (which isn't that much slower than firing up Firefox and loading Gmail) it's pretty responsive. Search is good now too, though I'd still give Gmail the win in that category.
Organizing by folders is a clear win for organization. Note that it is the #1 gripe about Gmail by far. Searching is well and good, but humans are visual animals. Clicking through your tree and simply seeing what you have there allows you to use it, to some extent, like a to-do list (especially combined with marking for followup) while keeping your inbox clean. If you polled all power-emailers, I'd guess at least 9 in 10 would tell you they want folders.
Rules on Gmail are incredibly limited relative to the ones on Outlook. You can only do a few basic things (which granted, covers 80% of what you want to do).
I don't want to have to Google around for various contact sync applications which may or may not be up to date, have to be maintained, etc. I want it to just work trivially, out of the box, the way ActiveSync and Blackberry do.
The difference between IMAP/POP on a phone and push+Exchange is like the difference between masturbation and sex.
Outlook has unlimited storage, as does Exchange server. You can't criticize it for storage simply because some corporations limit it. It's vastly superior there.
My Exchange account has a Barracuda spam filter, which despite it's hideous UI does the job better than my Gmail account. Gmail generates way too many false positives.
So no, I think I had it just right, which is exactly why Outlook costs money but people continue to pay it.
The search is pathetic. This is huge. If you can't find your email, it's not very useful.
Organizing emails by folder isn't necessary if you have a powerful search facility. Gmail search is much faster than any outlook search and it actually gives you what you need. Manual folder organization is a waste of time.
Labels are useful with the rule wizard. And I have to say I find the rules on Gmail much nicer than Outlook. And unlike Outlook, you don't have to start up your client to run them.
You can sync your contacts, etc...Google has all kinds of sync softare (gry google-ing it).
You can access gmail from any phone that uses IMAP/POP (including blackberry).
You have 7 gigs of storage. Instead of the pathetic 100 meg that you usually see with corporate Exchange servers.
The spam filtering doesn't even compare. Google has mastered it.
You can hook gmail up to your own domain easily (google apps account).
And GMail is free.
I think you have it backwards. Gmail is the power user's email, outlook is for people who are stuck in the past.