Outlook problems (IMAP and attachments)

[Nagual]

Two issues keep coming up:

1) IMAP with Gmail is unbelievably slow. If Gmail itself is not to blame, why is it that it takes several minutes to log on and get my headers (I have a manual/minimum size config going to help speed it up) and sometimes more than one try even when I have good signal strength? What if anything can I do?

2) Attachments - say I have a PDF and I open it up with Adobe Reader LE - very cool - but I can't use Outlook to save the specific file anywhere. I tried checking the 'storage card' option but all I end up with is a folder full of Outlook files which have no file association. I had to uncheck that option and delete it, since it was useless. Is there a program function to save message attachments I haven't found? I can't believe MS would overlook that.

Thanks in advance.