Thunderbird Advice

[Eben56]

With all the excitement around Firefox new release, I have a few questions about Thunderbird Email.
I currently use Outlook but have become intrigued by THunderbird which is basically the Email product from the same people.
I need to be able to set up different folders for people in my family to find their Email in their folder. Can I set it up so the mail that comes in from my wife's account is put in a separate folder from my Email?
ALso, I use a spam filter that only works with Outlook. Thunderbird advertises spam filtering, but is it really as good as they say?
I only ask because we get 2-300 Email a day of which about half are sent to the spam folders. (I have had my same address for years)

I know I could just try it but there are hours of setup, training, searching for lost shit, etc. I am too lazy to fix what ain't broke unless a feel reasonably assured it is a good idea.

Part of my question is selfish as I am close to upgrading my computer and I love Office 2007... But to include outlook is like $200.00 more. (Home Vs Office edition)

Thanks. ANy insights would be appreciated.

[Dreamstalker]

I use a standalone spam filter called Mailwasher. What that does is "download" the email headers/sender before Thunderbird actually does (if that makes sense) and it allows you to reject/bounce specific mails. AFAIK, the bounce feature makes it look like a "no such address" notice from your server (careful though, as a lot of spam uses nonexistent senders in the first place and all that a bounce would do is send it endlessly ping-ponging back and forth and tweak off a lot of admins in the process).

Thunderbird has a junk mail tool, but you have to teach it what is and isn't spam/scam mail. Other than that it works pretty well.

You can use the Account Setup tool to create as many email aliases in one program instance as you want. Careful though, there's a setting for "Global Inbox" and you don't want to use that. I think there's also a Profile Manager so each person has their own Thunderbird instance.