I haven't even bothered using any mail client for ages, but for various reasons I decided recently to use one again.

My requirements are simple:

Sync contacts, calenders and email from Hotmail and Gmail. Don't need any fancy stuff with syncing to phones, Exchange or whatever.

Microsoft Live Mail is supposed to do the job, Except there's a problem:

When it syncs the Live Calender, it frequently freezes updating. The client still works, but unless you notice that it's been saying "updating calender" in the corner for the last 4 hours or even weeks, all of your sent mail remains unsent and you don't receive any either.

I'm on XP and it would appear that my version of Live is the latest available even though I think it's from years ago, that being 14.0.8117.416

Googling suggests that other people have the same problem and there is no fix. I can't simply turn off calender because I have friends who share with me.

Anyone know if it's possible to get Thunderbird to sync with Live Calender, or if there are any alternatives? I'd consider paying if it's not more than 99p or so. Upgrading to Windows 7 is not an option right now so it has to work on either XP or Ubuntu - ideally both.

Any suggestions before I just go back to using a browser? And no, I'm not changing my friends

The gf uses hotmail/live mail and it has become a pain in the arse recently. If you download an attachement it is stored as a live.doc file and you have to specify correct program to open it every time.

I've used Outlook since 1993, with a short time over at KMail on Linux...

Outlook is more than 99p I think Dave.

I've looked at Kmail but can't find a Live Mail connector for it?

Because I had a Hotmail account since 1994, I had access to POP and IMAP back then, something they stopped giving to users who registered after 1999... They removed that now as well.

I used to have pop too, but that's not important. Pop can't sync calenders and contacts which is the reason I'm using Live Mail.