Re: [PLUG] OT: Comparing POP3 and IMAP

[Paul <paul@dpagin.net>]

What is more important to a user, the actual time or the perception of time?

IMAP seams faster if, for the moment, you choose not to read every 
message that comes in.  The message headers download very fast.  Only 
the selected messages download completely.  So, if you are on a slow 
link and don't want to download that message with a 5Meg attachment, you 
can skip or delete it quickly.  If you want to run through all messages 
quickly, then POP seams faster.

So, the actual time is not really a concern for me.  The perceived time 
is, dependent on my reading style.  There are more important features of 
IMAP which make it superior to POP.  The ability to check mail from 
multiple computers without having local mailboxes getting out of sync. 
The benefit of not losing mail if the client computer crashes since the 
mail is kept on the server which is also backed up.  Maybe more secure.

From the server side, I think POP is better since the messages are 
removed from the server when they are viewed.  But, actually, drive 
space is pretty cheap, so it might not matter.

Given a choice, I would always choose IMAP.  As far as the actual 
statistics of sending and recieving, I don't know and it really doesn't 
matter to me.



Bradley Molnar wrote:

> Hi all-
>
> for a class project, I am supposed to compare pop3 and IMAP.  We are
> supposed to compare anything we can find out about them.  I was planning on
> comparing speeds of sending/retrieving e-mail and how long it takes, throw
> in a bit of statistics, etc.
>
> What I wanted to ask the group was this -- how would you go about comparing
> the two protocals.  Would you use a regular client and a stopwatch (which is
> currently the fall-back plan), or, is there a mail client that can be
> configured to use both pop3 and imap that has a self timing system.
>
> thanks for your time and advice
> -brad



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