I gave Outspring Mail a brief tryout here and it certainly holds a lot of promise. I love the layout and the general UI look. Initially I thought the toolbar icons were a little... plain... but after a short while that ceased to bother me. In fact... as they are, they are wholly functional and not distracting.

The program doesn't seem to have the option to prefer text email over html email. One reason I like and stick with Mailsmith is because it can ignore HTML tags and present HTML mail like plain text, while still offering the option to view as HTML if I desire. I like this because, let's face it, some people have absolutely painful ideas of how to format their text in different colors and fonts!

While I must say I like the way Outspring formats quoted text (with the oversized quote marks and "boxing in" the quoted text), unfortunately this only shows on my side. When reviewing quoted text sent by Outspring in another client, there is no obvious way to see that the text has been quoted, aside from the one line that says "So and so said...". IMO, this is a HUGE no-no. I think it's a disservice to my recipients to be less than clear what the quoted text is, and what "level" it is. Outspring should consider using the standard >> quote indicators, and maybe convert them to how they display it now just for users of their own client.

I'm also VERY annoyed at the self-serving spam that Outspring adds to the bottom of every outgoing mail. That must... ABSOLUTELY MUST GO!

The program seems to have a few bugs that need to be worked out before it's ready for prime-time. It crashed on me twice unexpectedly. While replying to an email (to myself), the status box never went away... stating that it was "copying" the email (presumably to my Sent Items). In the meanwhile, the reply showed up in my Inbox so I cancelled the outgoing status box since it clearly did go through, and as it turns out, there was a copy in my Sent items also.

Overall, while I must again say that I absolutely LOVE the UI of this app (possibly one of the best!), it still seems a bit buggy to be ready for regular use. Those, as well as the other issues with quoted text and lack of "plain text" support really need to be addressed before I for one can seriously consider it as a replacement for Mailsmith. I didn't take the opportunity to try out the "Brain", but offhand it looks like it would prove to be very useful.