Small Business Server 2008 comes with a POP3 connector even though it is not listed in the Getting Started Tasks, and it is not configured by default. As a matter of fact, POP3 connector in Small Business Server has some history – it was included in Small Business Server 2003 (going back to Microsoft Backoffice Small Business Server 4.5).

You can use the POP3 connector to retrieve e-mails from external POP3 accounts (like accounts at your ISP or GMail) and to pre-selected Exchange Server Users or Distribution Groups. When you configure a POP3 connector in SBS 2008 keep in mind the following:

● When a user replies to an e-mail delivered through the POP3 connector, the message is sent from the local Exchange Server (or through a SmartHost – how to configure a Smart Host for Internet e-mail). Windows SBS 2008 does not route the reply through the original POP3 e-mail server.
● You can choose between the following types of authentication – BASIC (the logon credentials are sent unencrypted – in clear text), SPA (Secure Password Authentication), and APOP(Authenticated Post Office Protocol).
● You can use SSL (Secure Socket Layer – normally over port 995), if the POP3 provider supports this option. In that case, using BASIC authentication is fine, and we are demonstrating this scenario bellow.

In the following screencast, you will see how to configure a POP3 connector in Small Business Server 2008.

Step 1 In this step, you will follow the process of configuring and modifying the properties of POP3 connector in SBS 2008. We schedule the retrieval of e-mails from an external POP3 account, and then we check the result.