Did anyone completely drop everything for MobileMe?

[mac-mania]

I am contimplating, I'm guessing something that could look pretty dumb. I have some sort of infatuation with MobileMe, and I want to switch everything to MobileMe. Now, for reference my calendars are already in iCal, but my email and contacts are in GMail. I also have several years worth of archived email in my Gmail, and I'd basically be archiving that all for good.

Has anyone else made a switch like this in the past? The only one time I ever switched email was when I went to Gmail in 2004 or 5, from Hotmail. I wasn't quite as entangled in the internets (pun intended) then as I am now, so much is generally linked to your email it seems like it could take months to switch everything over so I'm wondering if anyone has done this recently.

My other thought was only change important things and let everything else work itself out, like my PayPal, bank, ebay, apple stuff, then over the course of the next few months anything that falls through the cracks, I can switch over in time.

Your thoughts?

Also, the reason for the MM switch is basically because I'd like a, albeit small, cloud of storage to host an iWeb site, and keep my new iMac and Air in sync. The email though comes from my dislike of fetch Gmail after using a Blackberry for 6 months.

 

[EthanNixon]

Hey,

I had a similar situation as you, though not as extreme. I used Gmail as my sole email and never had calendars until I had my iPhone. I did keep all of my contacts in Gmail, but never paid much attention to them until I had my iPhone.

I am sure there is a better way to do this, but when MobileMe first came out, you could not import contacts (you can now through vCards), so I had to manually put all of my contacts in. As far as the calendar, it is awesome to have it constantly updated on my Mac, PC, and iPhone via Push.

The email portion is the biggest factor in why I switched. It natively support Push for the iPhone, I am sure eventually the iPhone will have Push capabilities like the Blackberry, but this is the best solution right now. I can have all of my important emails forwarded to my MobileMe account, like my school account.

You can always sign up for the trial too, just to test it.

 

[MacAndy74]

Yes completely switched from my paid @live.com account. Never looked back. I also have MobileMe check my external ISP based email account.

 

[OZMP]

I also have MobileMe check my external ISP based email account.

how would i look at setting that up?

 

[movedx]

It's a shame I can't sync MM with my HTC Magic. I can probably access the @me.com e-mail account, but not the calender entries. It would be sweet to be able to sync the Google calender with the MM one.

 

[darkcanuck]

I didn't have any sync service prior, so i just put all my iCal and contacts right onto mobile me. I wanted to keep my gmail though, so i just set up a filter to mark all incoming mail as read, archive it, and forward it to my mobile me address. Then I set up my iphone and mac to send from my gmail address. Now I get the push of mobile me along with the spam filtering, filters, archiving, more professional looking email address, etc. of gmail. It's an amazing system, and I recommend it to anyone using a gmail account and iphone currently.

 

[WhoDatWayne]

I didn't have any sync service prior, so i just put all my iCal and contacts right onto mobile me. I wanted to keep my gmail though, so i just set up a filter to mark all incoming mail as read, archive it, and forward it to my mobile me address. Then I set up my iphone and mac to send from my gmail address. Now I get the push of mobile me along with the spam filtering, filters, archiving, more professional looking email address, etc. of gmail. It's an amazing system, and I recommend it to anyone using a gmail account and iphone currently.

If you do not mind me asking, how do you "set up my iphone and mac to send from my gmail address"?
Thanks

 

[jdechko]

If you do not mind me asking, how do you "set up my iphone and mac to send from my gmail address"?
Thanks

Settings > Mail, Contacts, Calendars > Default Account

 

[WhoDatWayne]

Settings > Mail, Contacts, Calendars > Default Account

Thanks! I can not believe I missed that one!

 

[jdechko]

Glad to help. It happens to all of us at times.

 

[QCassidy352]

I have used gmail for a long time but never liked google's contact or calender solutions (I just used ical and address book locally on my mac). I recently signed up for mobile me, but I've not yet been able to drop gmail. The main reason is speed. Mobile me on the web is slow. Really slow. So slow it makes just managing email painful at times. Gmail, on the other hand, is very fast.

Don't get me wrong - mobile me is very nice. I love that my contacts and calenders now stay in sync over the air, I'm looking forward to the idisk app, and I hope I never have to use my main reason for going with MM: the "find my iphone" and remote wipe capability. For $70 (amazon), I'm very happy.

But I just can't see ditching gmail entirely until apple *drastically* improves the performance of the MM web interface. It's certainly much prettier and more mac-like than gmail, but I can't get around the performance issues.

 

[QuarterSwede]

My wife and I recently went to MobileMe only because the calendar sharing works perfectly for us and all other options (Google Calendar included) were painful to setup or were hacks. That is the only option we're currently using at the moment. Personally, I don't like going to paid email systems. I'm much more comfortable with GMail at the moment and don't see myself transitioning to MobileMe.

 

[slashjunior]

I have completely dropped Google for MobileMe. I used Google Sync before which worked well but just not as nicely integrated as MobileMe.

I always thought MobileMe was slow. Although I just opened Gmail and MobileMe web at the same time in Firefox and both opened in exactly the same time. The only thing I would recommend is set up forwarding on MobileMe to Gmail because of the incompatibilities with Internet Explorer. I occasionally have to use computers with only IE so I open up Gmail instead, although that is not very often with my iPhone.

 

[Simgar988]

I just dropped my gmail account for mm for the sole reason that I have thousands of unread messages and I hate always having a bunch of unread emails on my iphone mail app

 

[rKunda]

I used MM for everything but email. I tried to manage email through gmail to MM for push, but failed. Given that tip above, I might try again.

Edit: What does that default setting actually do? If I am in my gmail mail a new email is sent from gmail (set as default), if I go into the MM box and create a new email, it sends from my .mac address. I don't get it.

 

[GeneralP]

I used MM for everything but email. I tried to manage email through gmail to MM for push, but failed. Given that tip above, I might try again.

Edit: What does that default setting actually do? If I am in my gmail mail a new email is sent from gmail (set as default), if I go into the MM box and create a new email, it sends from my .mac address. I don't get it.

you know with Gmail you can use your MM account and when you send the email from MM it will look like it was sent from your Gmail or anyother email address you designate

 

[rKunda]

you know with Gmail you can use your MM account and when you send the email from MM it will look like it was sent from your Gmail or anyother email address you designate

Any pointers on how to do that?

 

[OasisFanboy]

Hey - I'm currently in my MobileMe trial period.

I'm contemplating whether or not to continue into a full subscription.

Am I correct that iTunes has the functionality to autosync Contacts, Notes & Calendar whenever I physically connect my 3GS and Macbook?

If that's the case, I don't really have a need for MobileMe as I charge the iPhone through the Macbook when I'm at home so these apps will update daily which is sufficient for me.

 

[rKunda]

Yes, that's correct.

 

[MacVixen]

Hey - I'm currently in my MobileMe trial period.

I'm contemplating whether or not to continue into a full subscription.

Am I correct that iTunes has the functionality to autosync Contacts, Notes & Calendar whenever I physically connect my 3GS and Macbook?

If that's the case, I don't really have a need for MobileMe as I charge the iPhone through the Macbook when I'm at home so these apps will update daily which is sufficient for me.

Yes all of those will sync when you connect your phone to iTunes. It does mean though that you have to sync fairly regularly to keep both systems up-t0date.
The advantage that I find with MobileMe, however, is of course having my calendar and contacts sync automatically. I've never had a problem with MM being slow - it's always worked great for me. My favorite part is the email piece though - push works great and I love that if I read an email on my phone it's marked as read on my computer, or vice versa. What a time saver and less confusion for me.

 

[rKunda]

Yes all of those will sync when you connect your phone to iTunes. It does mean though that you have to sync fairly regularly to keep both systems up-t0date.
The advantage that I find with MobileMe, however, is of course having my calendar and contacts sync automatically. I've never had a problem with MM being slow - it's always worked great for me. My favorite part is the email piece though - push works great and I love that if I read an email on my phone it's marked as read on my computer, or vice versa. What a time saver and less confusion for me.

I agree, I loved MM push email. I like gmail better though as a system, especially with constant archiving, great searching and all the other functions that MM lacks. If only gmail pushed!

 

[Diaresi]

If only gmail pushed!

It does! Apple have crippled the functionality of Mail on the iPhone so it doesn't work. IMAP IDLE Mail on Mac OS X does have this functionality.

Gmail + Google Calendar + Google Contacts + Google Sync + Dropbox + Flickr renders MobileMe a complete waste of money IMO.

Of course MobileMe is all integrated and such and as far as setting it up it's incredible simple.

 

[rKunda]

My mistake for not being more clear. I was only referring to iPhone.