Windows Live Hotmail Goes Live!

  • Article

live hotmail

After nearly 2 years of beta testing our new Windows Live Hotmail service has gone Live today with support for 36 languages.  Windows Live Hotmail is the successor to MSN Hotmail and is the most significant update to our webmail service since 1996.  There are a whole bunch of new features but what I noticed after I upgraded my account as how much it now looks like Outlook and Outlook Web Access.  So at a high level below are some of the key features:

  • Improved Spam Protection - We got lots of feedback on the issue of spam and Hotmail inboxes.  We now have a colour coded safety bar which helps you clearly identify suspicious email; One Click Spam protection Tools and every email goes through a Virus Scanning engine.
  • 2GB of storage - Double what was available in MSN Hotmail.
  • Faster than ever - We now have a reading pane like Outlook which helps you read messages without opening them; Auto-Complete and drag and drop capability.
  • Customizable - Personalize your inbox with different themes and get your email on the go with support web-enabled mobile devices.  And with the Outlook Connector you can use Outlook to access and manage your Windows Live Hotmail account.
  • Choose your Version - There are 2 versions available:  Full Version which has the new look and feel and is designed for those with a fast Internet connection and a Classic Version which is a simple and fast way to manage your email.

So what does the inbox look like?  Well today I updated my MSN Hotmail account which took about 5 minutes and this is what my inbox looks like now.

jeffahotmail

So now my inbox is much richer looking and looks very similar to OWA and Outlook.  So the next thing was to install the Outlook Connector which was easy enough and once it was installed and restarted Outlook for me it gave me this screen.

outlook connector1

Once I added my logon details my Windows Live Hotmail Account is now added to Outlook. Sweet!

So head over to www.discoverhotmail.com for all the details and get a new account our upgrade your existing one!

Cheers, Jeffa