Exchange Server - Silly QSTN

Hey just a question about Exchange Server. We are looking at buying into a Hosted Exchange Server for emails. We currently use Pop mail in the office.

I wanted to know if the search functionality is as quick using exchange server as it would be using Pop on a local machine which is indexed. The sales guys on the phones say yes - but I have no way of testing without signing upto their email server packages and trialling it myself. Anyone have experience exchange outside of their office and searching?

I will use Outlook 2007 probably and hook into the hosted exchange server/mail mainly which we need to share between a number of users. We needed to search through a common mailbox and folders for customer enquiries and quick searches means higher productivity for us...

Cheers for comments.

[fastdruid]

The advantage of exchange is that it is essentially a database with all the advantages that gives. ie quick searching, as to how quick in comparison it really depends on load and what machine you have!

On a serious note have you considered gmail, its damn quick and they sell it as a service.

Druid

[Kalessin]

If you're only interested in the email and none of the extended functions like contacts and calendar, why pay the extra for Exchange? IMAP will do what you want, for a fraction of the price. Most email clients will cache a local copy of all messages and just sync changes. This makes searching just as quick as POP.