syncing entourage mail with iphone

Mail doesn't sync. Rather, your desktop and your phone each talk to the email server individually, and download email individually.

So, that said, it depends on the settings in your email account and server.

It sounds like the phone may be marking the emails as read on the server, and Entourage is only downloading messages marked as new on the server.

Your best bet is to talk to the people who run the ntl account (whatever that is). They should be able to help you get it worked as you wish. The options you have depend on whether the account is set up as POP or IMAP, etc.

It doesn't really matter that it's Entourage--any desktop client (Mail, Thunderbird, non-Exchange Outlook) should work pretty much the same way. The critical information is POP or IMAP, and then how settings are set on each machine.

I will note that I have a POP account feeding both iPhone Mail and Entourage, and I get all the same messages in both places without a problem. Read status is only local to that machine. (It's not actually a good setup, but it works for me). The relevant settings on the iPhone are hidden under Advanced.

Push access for received messages applies to an email account that supports this. With the iPhone's Mail application, Push access for received messages is supported with a MobileMe account, with a Yahoo account created with the Yahoo account preset included with the iPhone's Mail application, and with an Exchange account accessed via ActiveSync with the Exchange server for the account.

Push access for received messages had no bearing on this.

Sounds like the email account is a POP account and if so, although a POP account can be accessed with more than one email client, a POP account is designed to be accessed with a single email client only. With a POP account, only one email client at a time can check the incoming mail server for new messages and/or download new messages received at the incoming mail server. If a 2nd email client attempts to do this while another email client is doing the same, the incoming mail server will temporarily lock out the 2nd email client from accessing the incoming mail server and downloading any new messages while another email client is doing the same. This is a limitation with a POP account which is designed to be accessed with a single email client.

Do you leave Entourage launched and running actively checking the account for new messages and downloading new messages received at the incoming mail server while your iPhone is doing the same?

This is not a problem with an IMAP account, which is specifically designed for more than one email client to access the incoming mail server at the same time along with all server stored mailboxes with the account kept synchronized with the server automatically with each email client used to access the account. Not possible with a POP account.