Thanks to everyone for posting these 'options'. I did a google search and found some alternatives - from freeware through to commercial versions. Of course - it's nice when you get recommendations from people who have used the 'alternative' - especially from a site you trust.
I'm going to check out some of the above mentioned options - and see how I like them.
Also - has anyone here used either of these programs: Pegasus or "iscribe".
Pegasus is free - and I did download and install it - but it seemed rather difficult to figure out. The greatest concern for me was that there was a 'preview' pane on the inbox ( a security risk in my opinion) and I couldn't find a way of closing it. If I can't exercise the option of closing the 'preview pane' function - the program is 'history'!!! And if there is an option and it's that difficult to find I'm not too pleased either. Still - If I can find out how to close this off I might give it a try.
The other program - 'iscribe' seems really neat. It doesn't install - just unzip. You can place it anywhere - and no registry entry. It has a 'password' protect for the program - whereby you have to enter your password in order to get the folders (with mail, address, etc) to even display. You also have password entry into your ' connection' options . I don't know a lot about security - but this "seems" like a really neat idea to me.
The program itself is very simple - but as I don't do anything elaborate with emails - it has all the functions I need.
The only thing I don't know is 'security issues'. - are there any??? etc.
Thanks for the feedback - and let me know if you have any info on this topic that might be helpful in my search for a more secure prog than microsofts.
Gadfly
PS - the link to "iscribe" is
http://www.memecode.com/scribe.php
if your interested