Hard Drive Space Hog - Email

Another frequently overlooked area for cleaning up your hard drive, and thereby speeding up your computer, is your email folders. Some versions of Windows XP have a pop up helper to remind you to save space here, but it is often disabled or ignored like so many other annoying pop up windows.

First, it is always best to delete those old emails that you don't really need to save - especially those with attachments as they can take up a lot of room. But, did you know that deleting the email from your inbox does not automatically give you more space on your hard drive? Even deleting it from the 'deleted items' folder will not automatically recover the lost space. That's because the 'empty' space that used to contain that email is still there - taking up space! It's kinda like erasing something from a chalk board - the information is gone, but the chalkboard is still there.

The most effective way to regain space from your email folders is to 'compact' them. Even if you haven't deleted any email, this process can save up to 50% of the space taken up by your email. That can mean freeing up 100, 200 or even 400 Megabytes of storage space. If you delete a bunch of emails with attachments your space saving can be far greater. Try to remember to do this at least monthly to help maintain your PC's optimum performance (see screenshot below):

1. Start Outlook Express


2. Click on 'Local Folders' just to highlight it


3. Now, at the top, click on 'File'


4. Mouse Over 'Folders' then click on 'Compact All Folders'

Your computer will begin the process of compacting all of your mail folders. Note: If you have never done this before, the process may take quite some time. You may want to consider starting it at night at let it finish while you are sleeping.

2 Computers - 1 Email account

More and more families have 2 computers. Sometimes these computers share a single email address. The problem arises when someone accesses the email from one computer, and then later when using the other computer the email is gone. If you are using Outlook Express for your email (not AOL) then the solution is easy. You want to leave the original email on your ISP's mailserver and only download a copy to each (or both) computers. To accomplish this you must only change one setting on each computer. So, do this on BOTH (or all, if more than 2) computers (see screenshot below):

1. Open Outlook Express


2. On the top - click on "Tools" then "Accounts"


3. Double click on the name of your email account that you want to share.


4. On the next small window that opens click on the "Advanced" tab.


5. Place a check in the box labeled "Leave a copy of messages on server"


6. You may also want to check the box "Remove from server when deleted from 'Deleted Items' to keep from going over your mailbox size limit.


7. Click OK then Close and you're done!

Now both of your computers will have access to all of the email coming to that address.