Greater storage option for Hotmail users

Microsoft Corp. announced a global storage upgrade for the 260 million active MSN Hotmail user accounts by increasing the storage limit from 250 MB to 1 GB.

The other enhancements offered by the software major, is allowing of inactive accounts an expiration period of 60 days for accounts that are more than two years old, instead of the prior 30-day period.

The upgrade is being seen as an attempt to meet the evolving needs of Hotmail users as they make the transition to Microsoft's next generation email service, Windows Live Mail, which is currently in beta.

The storage upgrade, which was brought out in Asia on November 7, will affect Hotmail users in ten markets in the region including Australia, China, India, Hong Kong, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Taiwan, Thailand and Singapore.

Hotmail has taken a long time in catching up with market leaders such as Gmail, which had introduced its service with 1 GB storage capacity, in April 2004 and upgraded it to 2GB in 2005. Yahoo! Mail and RediffMail have also had 1 GB storage capacity for almost 2 years.

"MSN continues to invest in the needs of its users; this upgrade is part of our commitment to deliver a rich email experience to our users. We believe the added storage space and extended expiration period will be welcomed by our loyal Hotmail users," Krishna Prasad, programming head of MSN India & Windows Live, said.

Lycos mail is also huge with it providing 3GB of storage space to its users. However, when it comes to aestheticism, it loses out to both Gmail and Yahoo mail. Well, Windows Live mail is supposed to be the answer to these and is being termed as the next generation mail service provider.

Some of the other features Microsoft claims to have incorporated into its enhanced mail service include anti-phishing features, address Auto complete, and drag-and-drop functionality making it easier to read, send, and organize email messages.