This table summarizes testing done on the sending and receiving capabilities of ten e-mail programs on the Windows platform. Results for traditional Chinese and simplified Chinese are identical, and therefore separate categories have not been created for them. Hotmail can be configured for a preferred language other than English. The testing here includes Hotmail configured for English, traditional Chinese or simplified Chinese as the preferred language on the sending end, but only Hotmail configured for English on the receiving end. In Outlook Express, messages can be sent in either HTML format (the default format) or plain text. Regardless of whether you choose HTML or text as your format, you are asked to choose between sending your message either "in Unicode" or "as is" whenever you send a message in Chinese. The testing includes all four possible combinations for Outlook Express: HTML/Unicode; HTML/As Is; Plain/Unicode; Plain/As Is. In Outlook 2002, the user can send e-mail in either HTML format (default), rich text, or plain text. The testing here includes all three possible formats for Outlook. Three of the e-mail clients tested, Eudora 4.1.1, Pegasus Mail 4.02, and MyRealBox, can receive Chinese messages some of the time but not send them.

The testing therefore is on 130 combinations of 13 sending formats for 7 programs and 10 receiving e-mail clients. Web-based e-mail clients have been tested only with Internet Explorer 6.0. Results for other Web browsers such as Netscape or Opera may differ.

Sending & Receiving Messages in Chinese	Receiving E-Mail Client										Total no. of receiving e-mail clients decoding messages correctly from sending format
Sending E-Mail Client	Eudora 5.1.1	Hotmail (English)	MyRealBox: Web	Netscape Mail 7.0	OperaMail	Outlook Express 6.0	Outlook 2002	Outlook Web Access	Pegasus Mail 4.02	Yahoo Mail
Hotmail:
English as Preferred Language											9
Chinese as Preferred Language											8
Netscape Mail 7.0											8
OperaMail											9
Outlook Express 6.0:
HTML/Unicode											7
HTML/As Is											10
Plain/Unicode											6
Plain/As Is											0
Outlook 2002:
HTML											8
Rich Text											8
Plain Text											8
Outlook Web Access											2
Yahoo Mail											9
Total no. of sending formats correctly decoded by receiving e-mail client	8	9	8	11	11	11	12	5	6	11

	Message cannot be read or decoded.
	Message appears correctly as is.
	Message appears as code initially, but if you select Japanese (Auto-Select) from the View/Encoding submenu, it will display properly.
	Message appears as code initially, but if you select traditional or simplified Chinese depending on its original coding from the View/Encoding submenu, it will display properly.
	Message appears as code initially, but if you select Japanese (Shift_JIS) from View/Character coding/More/East Asian submenu, it will display properly.
	Message appears as code initially after you opened it in its own window. But if you close the message window, select Japanese from the language bar/button, then re-open the message, it will display correctly.
	Message appears as code initially after you opened it in its own window. But if you close the message window, select traditional or simplified Chinese depending on its original coding, and then re-open the message, it will display correctly.
	Message appears as code initially, but if you select Unicode from the View/Encoding submenu, it will display properly.

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