Default to External Email with ZCS Open Source?

[bjones2011]

We have installed Zimbra Collaboration Suite 7 on Ubuntu 10.04. Is there a way to have the web-based version of ZCS function like Outlook? Meaning, can we set up Zimbra to access (i.e. send and receive) using external pop3 and smtp?

The intention is to basically replace what Outlook does now with the web-based version (and all the bells and whistles of the collaboration - IM, calendar sharing, email sharing, etc.) of Zimbra.

We are not particularly interested in hosting out own email server (we'll leave that up to the web hosting company). Rather, we just want Zimbra to fetch the email when needed (we figured out how to do this with the "external" email feature); and to be able to "send" email as we would with a normal Outlook setting (using authenticated SMTP settings through our hosting company, e.g. as described here: Setting up Your POP3/IMAP email account | Arvixe Blog).

We want Zimbra to default to these external email accounts for each user. Can this be done?