Topic: Microsoft confirms Hotmail POP3 access for US and Brazil

[Samker]

Earlier, you may remember Neowin reporting that the Windows Live team had added POP3 functionality to their Hotmail service. Unfortunately, it has only available in select countries, but now they've expanded.

A blog post from the Windows Live Hotmail team has confirmed that you can now get POP3 Hotmail access in the United States, and Brazil. Microsoft has been adding more features to Hotmail over the last week and had promised POP3 access for the US and Brazil would be coming this week, and they have delivered. Previously, United States users of Hotmail had to change their country to get access on mobile devices. Now it's natively supported, ready to go.

Here's a reminder on how to set it up:

POP server: pop3.live.com (Port 995)
POP SSL required? Yes
User name: Your Windows Live ID, for example yourname@hotmail.com
Password: The password you usually use to sign in to Hotmail or Windows Live
SMTP server: smtp.live.com (Port 25 or 587)
Authentication required? Yes (this matches your POP username and password)
TLS/SSL required? Yes

For those unsure what this all means, basically you can now get easy Hotmail access on your BlackBerry or iPhone. On an iPhone, all of these settings are auto-detected when after you give the device your email address. You can also use non-Microsoft desktop email clients such as Thunderbird or Mac Mail to connect to Hotmail and download your messages.

United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, France, Japan, Spain, Germany, Italy, and the Netherlands all previously had access and the team expects to add more countries soon, so keep watching.

(NeoWin)