Setting up Exchange e-mail on the new iPhone

I know this is way off topic. Don’t worry — this will NOT become an iPhone blog. I promise.

First, I found a great blog post that walks you through how to set up your Microsoft Outlook (Exchange) e-mail account on the iPhone: How To Set Up iPhone Exchange ActiveSync. There was one problem for me, however. Although many Exchange servers have a domain like “exchange.domainname.com” — mine has a different subdomain, instead of “exchange.” Now, I thought I knew what that subdomain was. Turns out, the one I knew actually redirects to another one. The one I knew did not work on the iPhone, even though in other cases, it does redirect successfully.

An e-mail to our IT folks got me the answer, and once I had typed in the actual subdomain, all was well.

Second, I have seen misinformation about the ability to sync the iPhone 3G with an Exchange server. Some reports incorrectly claim that you need to buy the Enterprise Data plan from AT&T to get the Outlook e-mail sync. WRONG. I bought the cheapest consumer plan AT&T offers in the U.S., the 450-minute AT&T Nation Plan. It includes unlimited e-mail and unlimited data. (However, NO text messages are included. Text-message plans are add-ons.)

And I’m getting my Outlook e-mail on the phone now.

P.S. The old, original iPhones can also sync Exchange/Outlook e-mail now, if they are upgraded to the new iPhone 2.0 software.

Update 2 (July 14): A 54-second video shows you how to set up your Exchange e-mail on the iPhone. (However, if you’re reading this on an iPhone, don’t bother clicking — it’s Flash video. You can’t see it.)

Update 1 (July 14): A very in-depth review at Ars Technica says:

E-mail performance was on par with the BlackBerry, though the iPhone did seem to update our inbox faster than a BlackBerry Pearl. Reconciliation was far superior on the iPhone, as we routinely had stranded messages on the Pearl after moving or deleting from Outlook. So far, our iPhone 3G’s ActiveSync is keeping messages 100 percent in sync.

The iPhone’s Exchange support loses some of its shiny appeal, however, when you branch out from basic mobile e-mail synchronization. As mentioned elsewhere in this review, Mail’s UI for navigating between accounts and mailboxes hasn’t improved, and you need to tap a frustratingly excessive amount of times just to move between messages in business and personal accounts.

Even worse, there’s still no search.

I have found mail search to be horrible in Outlook/Exchange in all cases. If you need to search e-mail, you’re better off using Gmail.