Help? IS, WebAfrica, SMTP and Thunderbird

[lpvoid]

Hey guys,

I'm running Mozilla Thunderbird mail client and connecting to the IS network with a WebAfrica account. Thunderbird establishes a connection to smtp.isdsl.net but just sits there.

Does anyone have any idea what it could be. I'm beginning to think that Exim (IS's mail server application) is incompatible with Thunderbird.

Unfortunately the "support" at WebAfrica has been unable to assist. I don't think they even know Thunderbird exists...

I'd really appreciate some help and expertise here.

Thanks.

 

[4cer]

dumb question but you sure you not capped ... dunno if that makes a difference

 

[lpvoid]

Haha. I'm not capped.

 

[Grouter]

I really wanted to give thunderbird a go too, having been so impressed with firefox, but after a month or so of enduring various problems with 3 different email accounts, losing mail to who-knows-where and timeouts and failures to connect like you describe I switched back to windows mail (Vista).

Thunderbird doesn't seem to have the development backing that firefox has - sort of like the poor neglected cousin. A pity, 'cos I really liked not using the M$ product. But not when I start losing email for no apparent reason.

And the main thing I like about windows mail over outlook express and thunderbird (never used MS outlook) is that each mail is a .eml file, not stored as a .dbx and therefore less susceptible to getting corrupted.

 

[Moederloos]

I have been using Thunderbird for ages.
Our email is hosted by mail.busgateway.is.co.za and works fine.
Also works fine with google mail IMAP, and my own hosted domains.

Try telnet to the relevant ports to start with:
telnet ipaddress/domain name 25
telnet ipaddress/domain name 110

see if it responds.
What does happen with IS mail is THEY go down, and then email clients cannot connect. Our staff with Thunderbird experience "hanging", while Outlook staff get a "enter password" dialogue every 10 secs until their brains bleed.

 

[lpvoid]

Howzit guys. Thanks for the replies. I have actually telnet'ed into the smtp.isdsl.net and it does reply with its usual Exim header. I can helo and everything.

It seems like Thunderbird just doesn't like it for some reason. Unfortunately our domain is not hosted with IS and we're having issues with relaying so we can't use our own SMTP server.

Any thoughts?

 

[wavern]

IS and SMTP

I had a similar problem a few weeks ago using smtp.isdsl.net. According to IS they do not allow you to relay mail using their smtp server, only if you have an ISDSL account.

Alternatively you can use smtp.saix.net no authentication required.

I dropped you a PM to obtain additional details

 

[killadoob]

You can also try smtp.openweb.co.za