Exchange and BIS

[morfy50]

We recently moved to a hosted exchange account from POP. Any email sent to our POP account (person@<hidden>) would appear in both Outlook and the BB. Essentially we'd have duplicate email. A copy in Outlook and a copy on the BB.

Now with exchange, if we get email in Outlook, the email is not sent to the BB too. Is there anyway to set this up so that the email appears on both?

I think with POP we had Outlook set to leave a copy of the message on the server, but with Exchange I don't see this option anymore. Plus, from what i understand, our Exchange email is already saved on the server anyway.

We are using BIS.

[ifonline]

If you are trying to connect to an exchange server, you need to be on BES, not BIS. You might want to read up on how exchange works, as well, as it is not POP 3. It is more akin to IMAP, which is worlds better than POP 3. Maybe someone here can give better details on how exchange works...

[takeshi]

If you are trying to connect to an exchange server, you need to be on BES, not BIS.
Not necessarily. BIS/OWA may be an option. POP and/or IMAP access may be possible as well.

I think with POP we had Outlook set to leave a copy of the message on the server, but with Exchange I don't see this option anymore. Plus, from what i understand, our Exchange email is already saved on the server anyway.

How exactly was your BIS setup changed to accommodate Exchange?

[StuartV]

If you have hosted Exchange, you should have IMAP access available (check with your Exchange provider). If you do, then you can change/update your BIS config so that it uses IMAP to access your Inbox. You will only receive messages on your Blackberry on a 15 minute polling interval (i.e. it could take up to 15 minutes to receive an email on your Blackberry). Read/Unread status should sync between the two. Email sent from your Blackberry should show up in your Outlook Sent Items.

I would (and recently did, in fact) pay the extra $10 per month to add BES support to your hosted Exchange account, and $15 per month to your cell phone service provider to add BES support to your cell phone. If your hosted Exchange provider doesn't offer BES, or it's more than $10 per month per mailbox that uses BES, then change providers immediately!

A week or so ago, I moved one mailbox in my domain to a Hosted Exchange w/BES account with MailStreet.com. It's $20 per month, total, for that, plus an extra $15 per month to Verizon (compared to what I was paying before). But, $35 per month is WELL worth it to me for all the benefits that come from doing that. To wit:

- receive email immediately
- sent messages show in Sent Items folder
- items read in Outlook or on my BB show as Read on the other
- items deleted from Outlook or on my BB are deleted in the other and show in Deleted Items in Outlook
- rules for filing incoming messages in Outlook work. Those items on the BB initially show in my mail Inbox, but once read, automatically move to the appropriate folder.
- I can access other folders that are in Outlook on my BB
- I run Outlook in Cached Mode on my laptop so I have access to all my received email, Contacts, Calendar, etc. even if I'm somewhere that has no Internet access at all
- Outlook Web Access available in case my computer dies or I'm traveling and don't have it handy
- Host handles backups of my Mailbox (including Contacts, Calendar, etc.), so I don't have to worry about losing all my old messages or, more importantly, my Contacts.
- wireless all-the-time sync of Contacts, Calendar, Notes, and Tasks

I get a lot of email every day. Prior to getting on a BES, I was wasting a LOT of time every day reading messages twice (once on my BB and once in Outlook and deleting or filing them on both. Not to mention having to remember to manually initiate a sync every day to keep my Calendar and Contacts up to date. It is well worth $1 a day to me for the time I'm saving now.

Depending on how you set things up, there are ways that you can get almost all of these same features while still using BIS. But, I believe the only way to get ALL of these features is using BES. Further, with BES, it's really easy and it's directly supported by RIM. There's no worrying about whether some 3rd party is supporting things correctly or has some minor, undocumented except in the really, really fine print, shortcomings. It just works.

I recently started a thread also in this forum on Hosted Exchange w/BES providers. Look in there if you want more info on that.

[ifonline]

Not necessarily. BIS/OWA may be an option. POP and/or IMAP access may be possible as well.

Interesting, but I was considering proper integration with exchange (synced calendars, notes, etc.) Doesn't that require BES? Of course, I might have misunderstood what the OP wanted.