This series is dedicated to specific e-mail providers on the internet. In this installment, the service provider concentrated on will be Google’s Gmail.

Gmail, launched in March 2004, has grown to be one of the most-used free e-mail services on the internet. While it doesn’t have a large of a userbase as Yahoo! Mail or Hotmail, it’s still a force to be reckoned with.

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In this article we’ll be looking at how to set up Gmail with Windows Live Mail.

Windows Live Mail is to date the best free e-mail client Microsoft has ever delivered. It is built upon an improved Outlook Express engine with some extra added features.

You can use IMAP or POP enabled Gmail in the Windows Live Mail client easily. For this tutorial we’ll be using IMAP.

1. Launch the Windows Live Mail e-mail client.

2. Click Add an e-mail account from the left sidebar.

3. On the first Add an E-mail Account screen:

• Enter your e-mail address as your full e-mail address.
• Enter your password as your Gmail e-mail password
• Enter your display name as your name
• Check the box at the bottom to “Manually configure server settings for e-mail account.”
• Click Next.

See image below for example.

4.  On the next screen:

• Choose your incoming mail server as IMAP.
• Type in the incoming server as imap.gmail.com.
• Type in the port for the incoming server as 993.
• Check the box for “This server requires a secure connection (SSL)”.
• Set the Log on using as Clear text authentication.
• Type in your Login ID as your full Gmail e-mail address.
• Set the outgoing server to smtp.gmail.com.
• Set the outgoing server port to 465.
• Check the box for “This server requires a secure connection (SSL)”
• Check the box for “My outgoing server requires authentication”
• Click Next.

See image below for example.

5. You will get a confirmation notice the account setup is complete.

Click Finish here.

6. Windows Live Mail will download the IMAP folders from Gmail.

If you are prompted for a password, enter in your Gmail e-mail password.

7. At the Show/Hide IMAP Folders screen we don’t need to do anything here, so just click OK.

8. Right-click your Gmail account in the left sidebar and select Properties.

9. Click the IMAP tab.

10. Do as follows:

• Set your Root folder path to [Gmail] (including brackets).
• Check the box for Check for new messages in all folders.
• Check the box for Store special folders on IMAP server.
• Type in your Sent Items path as Sent Mail
• Type in your Drafts path as Drafts
• Type in your Deleted Items path as Trash
• Type in your Junk path as Spam
• Click Apply
• Click OK

See image below for example.

11. Windows Live Mail will prompt to refresh the folder list. Click Yes.

12. Windows Live Mail will refresh the list…

13. Click New at the top left to compose a new message.

14. Address a message to yourself as a test.

15. Click Send at the top left.

If you are prompted for a password, enter in your Gmail e-mail password.

You’re done!

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