Configuring an Email Account
In order to receive, read and send emails, you need to configure your Email Account. To configure, select Email account and click on Next.
Enter your Name and the Email address (for which you want to setup the account) and click on Next. 
Here, you need to supply values for POP/ IMAP (incoming server) and SMTP (Outgoing server). Here’s an explanation of POP, IMAP and SMTP.
POP
The term POP stands for Post Office Protocol. POP is an internet protocol which has been widely used to retrieve emails from a remote mail server on a TCP/IP network. While configuring the email client on your computer, you need to supply the value for POP. An example of the POP server name is shown below and if your service provider uses POP, they will be able to provide this for you.
Example: mail.mywebsite.com
IMAP
IMAP (Internet Message Access Protocol) is another popular internet protocol used to fetch emails for a remote mail server. However POP3 and IMAP perform the same tasks but IMAP will initially fetch only summaries of email and it then downloads full versions only of the emails you explicitly look at. On the other hand POP downloads all new emails to the local computer. To clearly differentiate between these two email protocols, refer to the following table:
| POP |
IMAP |
| Downloads all the new emails to the local computer. |
Downloads only the email’s summary at first. |
| POP is useful for accessing all your email from a single computer. |
Useful if you use multiple computers to access your emails. |
| Once the email is downloaded, it is erased from the mail server. |
Preserves all the emails until emails are manually erased from the mail server.
|
SMTP
SMTP stands for Simple Mail Transfer Protocol and is another Internet Protocol used for sending emails. It is also known as an outgoing mail server. Usually the physical mail servers for incoming and outgoing emails are the same. If you are confused specifying the SMTP address for your account setup, you can get this information from your ISP. In most cases, the address for incoming and outgoing sever are same.
Example:
smtp.mywebsite.com
The next figure shows the server information: 
Once you have entered the Incoming and Outgoing sever value, click on the Next button to proceed.
Enter the Incoming and the Outgoing user name given to you by your email provider. 
Click on the Next button.
Enter any preferred Account name. For example, Home Account or Work account. 
Click on the Next button. 
Here you can verify all the information you have supplied in the previous steps. You can check the option Download messages now if you wish to download messages from the remote email server.
Once you’ve clicked Finish, Thunderbird will ask you to provide the Password for your email account.
Finally click on OK and it’s done! Thunderbird will download all your mail. |