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10 Replies Last post: Jun 1, 2003 8:33 AM by GlennBlaylock  
Click to view TrishaM's profile New Member 7 posts since
May 29, 2003
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May 29, 2003 4:37 PM

Entourage vs. iCal/Mail/Address Book

I am looking for opinions from anyone who has spent time using both Entourage X and the built-in Apple apps, iCal, Address Book, and Mail.

I am currently using Entourage but considering dumping it, and would really like thoughts and opinions with some supporting logic if you have any.

Many thanks in advance for any opinions posted....

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Click to view Chris Breen's profile Macworld Editorial 2,943 posts since
Dec 11, 2000
1. May 29, 2003 4:43 PM in response to: TrishaM
Re: Entourage vs. iCal/Mail/Address Book
Others are free to disagree but I'd say that in nearly every case, Apple's offerings are weaker than what you get from Entourage. Entourage has more robust email filtering and a more full-featured calendar than what Apple offers in iCal. The advantage of the Apple apps is their integration with other applications (how nicely Address Book and apps like iChat work together, for example).

Chris
Click to view Ti_Guy's profile Member 304 posts since
Feb 24, 2001
3. May 31, 2003 7:01 AM in response to: Chris Breen
Re: Entourage vs. iCal/Mail/Address Book
In reply to:<hr />
... in nearly every case, Apple's offerings are weaker than what you get from Entourage ... The advantage of the Apple apps is their integration with other applications.

<hr />

This is exactly what I used to believe in, Chris. Now, after being heavily involved in Bluetooth and my trusty old SonyEricsson T68i, I have to disagree. The convenience of having a central place for contacts and calendar items, having them synched and updated with a single click, literaly, is truely liberating. Calendars for nearly everything are available to download from icalshare.com. Get a calendar for, say, dates and times of your favorite team's games, click "Synch Now" and everything is carried along with you. A "Home" number in AddressBook appears under "Home" on the T68i, same with Moblie, Work, Email, etc.

Needless to say, I'm using iCal extensively, now that all my reminders and appointments are synched effortlessly to my phone.

As for Entourage, I still use it as my sole email client. I still wish for an easy way to integrate its other features with my life as I now can with Apple's offerings. I still think Entourage has better mail managment, but Apple's Mail is looking quite nice. At least now it can leave a copy of POP mail on the server for a designated time. That was the one thing that kept me off Mail in the past.
Click to view Chris Breen's profile Macworld Editorial 2,943 posts since
Dec 11, 2000
4. May 31, 2003 10:27 AM in response to: Ti_Guy
Re: Entourage vs. iCal/Mail/Address Book
Good points, Ti Guy. I'm in the somewhat unique position that I have little need for a cell phone so Bluetooth and I aren't bosom buddies nor do I need to share calendars. So I guess I was speaking more to things like email filtering and basic calendar functionality. If you're looking for integration, a strong case can be made for Apple's offerings.

Chris
Click to view d00d's profile Macworld Editorial 12,136 posts since
Apr 24, 2001
5. May 31, 2003 11:27 AM in response to: Chris Breen
Re: Entourage vs. iCal/Mail/Address Book
Then again Chris, Entourage's spam filter is pathetic compared to Mail's. One of the reasons I switched back to Mail from Entourage was the fact that the spam filter was light years ahead of the one in Entourage.
Click to view rockinphotog's profile Old Hand 2,977 posts since
Oct 27, 2001
6. May 31, 2003 11:37 AM in response to: d00d
Re: Entourage vs. iCal/Mail/Address Book
In OS9, I was using Outlook Express for mail and Palm Desktop for calendar and contacts.

It was natural to move to Entourage for mail. I love it, but I do agree that the spam filter is not very intelligent (OK, it sucks).

I tried to use the calendar and contacts in Entourage, but every time I do, I end up wishing that it acted like Palm Desktop, which I still think is #1 for features, labels (color coding) and ease of use.
Click to view Chris Breen's profile Macworld Editorial 2,943 posts since
Dec 11, 2000
7. May 31, 2003 12:47 PM in response to: rockinphotog
Re: Entourage vs. iCal/Mail/Address Book
You're right that Entourage includes no automatic spam filtering -- I use a different program for that -- but Entourage is far more flexible in the ways it allows you to create your own filters.

Chris
Click to view d00d's profile Macworld Editorial 12,136 posts since
Apr 24, 2001
8. May 31, 2003 11:53 PM in response to: Chris Breen
Re: Entourage vs. iCal/Mail/Address Book
Well, Entourage does have automatic spam filtering, just not a learning filter like Apple's. I admit Entourage's filters are much more powerful. However, I could never find an efficient way to create a combined Inbox like Mail does. I created a view, but I found it was much too slow (which I can't explain) to be used efficiently.
Click to view Duke_Thomas's profile Member 757 posts since
May 25, 2001
9. Jun 1, 2003 1:03 AM in response to: TrishaM
Re: Entourage vs. iCal/Mail/Address Book
In reply to:<hr />
I am currently using Entourage but considering dumping it, and would really like thoughts and opinions with some supporting logic if you have any.

<hr />


A month ago I was in the same position you are in. I switched to Mail, and don't miss Entourage at all.

I'll admit to ChrisBreen's filtering observation. However, how much filtering capability do you need? My filtering needs are modest, just a few mailing lists here and there (which Mail does well enough), and other than that the filtering I care about is spam filtering. Entourage's spam filter is useless, while Mail has not misidentified a message of mine for about two weeks now, and never came up with a false positive! Mail handles IMAP accounts a lot better than Entourage... Entourage had this nasty little habit of invalidating the local cache several times a day and making me download the entire 1000+ entry message index again from the server if I wanted to review a new message. Ugh. I'll agree that Mail offers fewer features in terms of quantity, but they offer more than I need, and the features they do provide are of higher quality.

iCal has a fatal flaw regarding its treatment of reminders. If I have iCal set to remind me of something at 3 o'clock, and I log in at 3 o'clock and one second, I do not receive the reminder. After all, I was not logged in at 3 o'clock, the reminder was set to go off at 3 o'clock, and I couldn't possibly have been interested in the reminder one second after 3... right? However, if you're the sort that uses iCal as a calendar rather than as an alarm clock, then you'll do fine with it.

Other people have talked about Address Books' advantages.
Click to view GlennBlaylock's profile Enthusiast 1,065 posts since
Mar 10, 2001
10. Jun 1, 2003 8:33 AM in response to: Duke_Thomas
Re: Entourage vs. iCal/Mail/Address Book
There are some other things that I dislike about iCal and how it handles reminders. With Entourage, you get three buttons in the reminder (Open Item, Snooze, and Dismiss). These buttons give you much more flexibility in how you deal with reminders. Open Item allows you to run Entourage and open the event's record in one step so that you can go in and edit it if you want to. Snooze lets you tell the program to temporarily dismiss the reminder and then bring it back at a later time. (I just wish that MS would add an option to all you to enter a custom snooze time instead of having to always select one from their list of times.) Dismiss allows you to dismiss either the individual reminder or an entire series (if applicable). Choosing snooze or manually changing the reminder time in Entourage and saving both automatically close the reminder window. In order to do any of these functions in iCal, you have to manually open the iCal and the specific reminder and then edit it. Setting the reminder to a later time does not automatically close the reminder window. You have to also do that manually after you have reset the reminder time.

Because of these reasons and the one Duke_Thomas gave, I eventually went back to Entourage for my scheduling needs.