Mindful Musings

Sprint Mobile Email was launched sometime back in November 2006 with a lot of pomp and show but is barely advertised on their website today. It seems to have lost some favor to the VersaMail application that comes bundled with the Treo 755p. However, I find Sprint Mobile Email is better for my purposes. Here is a smallish review of sorts and the strengths and weaknesses that I have found. I would also like to document tips and tricks and hacks for Sprint Mobile Email for posterity. So if you have any good tips for Sprint Mobile Email, please leave a comment here.

You can download Sprint Mobile Email (referred to henceforth as SME) from Sprint’s website under the “Digital Lounge” menu item on http://my.sprint.com after you have logged onto your Sprint account. This is only available if your phone is capable of running Sprint Mobile Email. It is a quick and dirty download and setting up of email accounts is swift. The default setup enables push for the accounts but not scheduled checking of emails. This was supposed to be, I assume, the BlackBerry killer application but the push setup is hit or miss. Frankly, I have yet to get it to work. So though it is a good idea, execution leaves more to be desired. I have GMail setup along with a work account and they both work under SME as expected.

PS: You need unlimited data and/or unlimited text messaging for SME to work. I would be afraid of the data charges if you did not.

Pros:

• Setting up of emails is a breeze.


• The application is stable. Large icons for finger clicking helps a lot.


• Lots of key mappings, including side button mapping for email.


• On demand checking of email is very simple from keyboard.


• Navigation within the app is intuitive and fast. Lots of features to purge attachments and such to reduce space usage.


• Separate emails for separate accounts. I hate mixing of emails.

Cons:

• Push does not work for me. Some people have said that it takes a while to sync. Mine did not sync, ever.


• No timed deletion of messages. I wish I could make the emails delete automatically after x days. I missed this in VersaMail as well.

Tips and tricks:

• Hold down the mail button on your Treo to receive mail or sync with the mail account being viewed.


• Once you are viewing email for an account, click on the option button to get detailed preferences etc for the account including push setup and scheduled email checking. It took me a while to find this.


• Go back to the mail listing by clicking on the mail button anywhere in the app.


• The mail button, clicked once while in mail listing, allows you to switch between mail accounts.

I have gotten so used to SME that I actually use my phone to check email every morning without having to get on my computer. That is perfect for me. I am sure I am missing some quick tips and some cool feature or irritation but I will be sure to post them here. Do you like SME? Have you used it yet?