How to deal with huge IMAP account?

Question

What are the best practices of an IMAP Outlook 2010 account?

I found this link but I'd like more information on this http://www.oit.umn.edu/email/best-practices/index.htm

For example, is a 20,000 emails for 4.5 GBs too much or is it better to split it by year and have many archives? What is the best way to deal with it?

It is in Outlook 2010, I know if there's an error in the PST file it will take a long time to scan it. It will also take a long time to move/import/export or recreate it if there's an error in the future.

Is it better to limit the size of the inbox and not have unlimited? What is the best thing to do with the old emails? It should still be searchable though.

Answer 1

In outlook 2010? Well, depends on the server...

I have noticed problems with Gmail on any size IMAP account.

On pretty much any other IMAP server, I say, leave it all online.

If you are worried about an error, simply delete your local copy all together and redownload it from the server.