Problems sending with AOL as ISP

[Ian]

Hi All,

I realise this topic has come round before (a thread of over 200 posts in
2005 and a great link from Galen in 2005 as well) but I just wanted to get
some current feedback.

My scenario:
I provide IT tech support for my brothers business. Long time AOL customer
for email before broadband hit these UK shores. We decided to get our own
email account and domain through a hosting company and move to broadband. The
broadband connection is via AOL (our ISP). I've set up Outlook 2002 to
send/recieve email for the new email account and followed all the help I can
find for POP / SMTP servers including authentication.
I can recieve emails fine but sending is frustrating to say the least!
Sometimes messages go (tends to be first thing in the morning) then nothing.
The messages from Outlook are that the SMTP server cannot be found. I have
read info about SPAM filters, Rate Limits etc. that AOL impose and now figure
this is the problem. I've done all the antivirus/firewall disabling etc.. I
have my own laptop configured for my own email addresses using a different
hosting company and this works fine for me at home connected to an Orange
Broadband ISP. If I connet my laptop into my brothers AOL network I also can
no longer send emails only recieve.
This, to me, all points to the problem being with the AOL broadband
connection, and I'm not knocking AOL, they do what they do for a reason but
before I go completely crazy I wanted to get some feedback from this
community to see if there are others who have experienced similar problems. I
have warned my brother the solution for problem free emailing may well be to
ditch the AOL broadband and move to another ISP, is this reasonable advice?

I really appreciate any comments,
Ian.

 

[Lauren Giles]

....AOL is run by human souls. Drop them like you would drop a bag of dog
poo... that's on fire.

 

[Ian]

Hey Lauren, thanks for your comments, I guess I know where you stand on this!
Is there no-one else out there with any similar experience??

 

[Adam Bailey]

I can recieve emails fine but sending is frustrating to say the least!
Sometimes messages go (tends to be first thing in the morning) then nothing.
The messages from Outlook are that the SMTP server cannot be found. I have
read info about SPAM filters, Rate Limits etc. that AOL impose and now figure
this is the problem. I've done all the antivirus/firewall disabling etc.. I
have my own laptop configured for my own email addresses using a different
hosting company and this works fine for me at home connected to an Orange
Broadband ISP. If I connet my laptop into my brothers AOL network I also can
no longer send emails only recieve.

Get your hosting company to offer an SMTP server that listens on a port
other than 25. Problem solved.

 

[Ian]

Adam,

Thanks for the suggestions, I have contacted my hosting company and they are
going to give me another port to try. I'll let you know what happens,

Ian.

 

[Ian]

Hi Adam,

I tried using a different port number and as if by magic the problem has as
you said been solved. I'd be really interested to know how you knew to make
this suggestion. Are you involved in networking or web hosting? It's odd that
there are lots of links out threre discussing this problem but i have never
seen this simple suggestion mentioned once. You have saved me a whole lot of
trouble and I thank you very much.

Regards,
Ian.

 

[Adam Bailey]

Hi Adam,

Hi, Ian.

I tried using a different port number and as if by magic the problem has
as you said been solved. I'd be really interested to know how you knew to
make this suggestion. Are you involved in networking or web hosting?

I'm a student of the AOL mail system.

It's odd that there are lots of links out threre discussing this problem
but i have never seen this simple suggestion mentioned once.

The information you're looking for is on my web site at:
http://members.aol.com/adamkb/aol/mailfaq/3rd-party.html#3rd-party-acct

You have saved me a whole lot of trouble and I thank you very much.

Happy to be of assistance.

 

[Knibbster]

Hi Im having the same problem with Orange I cant send email's done everything
under the sun I would like to change the port number as you did can you let
me know what it was please as it is now effecting my work