The larger the inbox the more impact there is on performance. 4.6x and later are much faster in regards to all protocols, but especially from 4.0 to 4.6 there are so many stability fixes and performance benfits that there is every point in upgrading and getting a license.

I am currently using Mercury 4.01 + SpamHalter 4.3, and planning to upgrade to 4.72.
Questions are:
1. Can I upgrade directly from 4.01 to 4.72? That is, install 4.72 with same directory as 4.01? What I should look for to ensure the upgrade run smoothly, no change to the setting?

2. Since I already run SpamHalter 4.3, should I install this as well when installing 4.72?

3. I have some stubborn users who use webmail via IMAP (SquirrelMail), but don't create sub-folders. This creates Inbox with 10,000 or more messages. In 4.01, that frequently makes SM timeout or sometimes Mercury quit by itself, and has to be restarted. Does 4.72 provide better IMAP mail with such large Inbox?

4. Let's say my Mercury server logged-in and runs under user "A". At home, I want to change/update configuration, i.e. add user, update Content Control, etc. Usually I am using Remote Desktop in Windows, logged-in as user "B", run another instance of Mercury, update/change configuration. This works fine, except that I have to restart server, in order to activate the changes, otherwise Mercury still use the old config. Any better way doing this, so Mercury will pick up changes at real time?

Thanks.

1. Make a copy of the Mercury installation directory for backup in case you need to revert, but you should bascially be able to just run the installer and select Install update. Make sure Mercury is stopped before doing this. There is additional help information in the installer.

2. A new version of SpamHalter (4.5.1) is included in Mercury 4.72 setup, and you should upgrade. Leave the ini file unchanged.

3. IMAP has been improved a great deal since 4.01, but an Inbox with 10 000 messages will still be slow.

4. For Mercury 5.0 a complete remote interface is being planned, but for now the separate HTTP interface offers only a subset of actions like create user, change autoreplies, and restart server. I usually use VNC to remote control the session that Mercury runs in. Starting two instances of Mercury running against the same directory is not advisable, and if detected Mercury should no longer allow it.

/Rolf 

Thanks for the reply. Another thing, in 4.72, does large Inbox has effect in retrieving POP3 messages? Yesterday I had a case, the user in LAN has incredibly slow in retrieving mails using POP3 mail client, kind of hung actually. Turns out that this user has 8000 Read messages in Inbox (Mercury Inbox), and 100 Unread. So, I delete about 7000 messages (basically delete 7000 CNM files), and retrieve mails again, this time it retrieved 100 Unread messages very fast, less than one minute. Does it same in 4.72?