Carlos Altgelt said:
For some reason I don't understand, I cannot send messages
with OUTLOOK any more, altough I can receive them. Every
time I want to send a message the Outlook screen freezes.
I'm able to read the messages via
www.mail2web.com.
The technical support at PeoplePc spent over one hour
trying to help (I had to call them twice) but in the end
they couldn't, even we delreted programs and
uninstall/install Outlook a couple of times.
Can anyone help?
Did they ever check that the host running their mail server program is
actually reachable by you? In a DOS shell, run:
ping <POP3server>
where <POP3server> is whatever you have configured in your e-mail
account for the POP3 server. It is possible that they have disabled
ICMP on that host and so there will be no response to pings (you get
timeouts), but in every mail server that I've used the mail server's
host will respond to pings (if you ping while connected to their
network). If the ping times out (because they have disabled it), try
doing a traceroute to their mail server:
tracert <POP3server>
This command is available in NT-based Windows. You didn't mention which
version of Windows you are using (you didn't mention your version of
Outlook, either). If you are using a 95-based version of Windows then
do a Google search for a traceroute utility. I also use Blighty's
SamSpade and Analogx's HyperTrace. Both are free.
If the ping gets a response, that only tells you that the *host* is
reachable, NOT that the mail server program on that host is loaded and
responsive. Did they ever check to make sure that you can actually
connect their mail server despite whatever e-mail client you may use?
Do the following in a DOS shell:
telnet <POP3server> 110
Do you get a connection, or do you get a message that the host is
unknown, unreachable, or times out? Whether you can do anything once
connected, and even if the connected times out in a few seconds, the
point is to see if you get any connection at all. If you do not get a
connection, you won't get a connection with any other software, either.
Call them back and tell them you cannot connect to their mail server
program on the host name they provided. If you can connect to their
POP3 server, then try connecting to their SMTP server (which is the one
for sending out the e-mail):
telnet <SMTPserver> 25
They may use the same host IP name for both servers but different port
numbers are used (110 for POP3 and 25 for SMTP). If you cannot get
connected to the SMTP server it could be that host is not reachable. If
it was a different host than for the POP3 server then ping the SMTP host
to make sure it is reachable and that the host responds. If the ping or
traceroute shows you can reach the host but you cannot telnet into it
then the host is up but not the SMTP server on it.
