POP3 Internet Access for Gmail/Yahoo

I am on a slow dial-up internet connection and using Outlook Express 6 as my E-mail client which is configured for POP3 access. I am experiencing two problems – (1) My mail client now fails to pull out emails from the web server i.e. Gmail and Yahoo etc. on to my hard drive as it used to do earlier and (2) If by chance, it pulls out a few emails onto my local drive, it pulls out older emails first followed by the latest ones. Please suggest if there are any settings on the Gmail/Yahoo websites and/or in my E-mail client (Outlook Express6) to make it pull all emails smoothly into my local inbox and in this order – newer emails first followed by older ones.