Free is not always without cost, if you know what I mean.
Generally developers who charge for a component have a lot of time invested in making it very robust plus have the input of a large user base to tweak and modify it. Plus you get many features you wont get from a free source.

POP3 Wizard is a low cost solution with a high ROI. It is an activex control that gives full support of POP3 Servers.
It has an easy to use Message object for parsing of messages. It allows you to download just headers, or specific messages.

You can check it out @
http://www.SeekfordSolutions.com/Products/POP3Wizard/

Calculate your wage and multiply it by the hours you have spent already looking for the free solution. Then add the amount lost by the opportunity cost.

That free code just got a lot more expensive.