Email - Troubleshooting
The mail won't go through . . .
Our basic level of service, when it comes to email accounts, is to provide our customer with a valid POP3 mail server address from which to query for new mail and if applicable, provide them with SMTP outgoing services.
However, there are times that it doesn't seem like anything will work. The biggest cause for failures is the presence of firewalls (both on the client computer and provided by your ISP) and improperly configured routers. Also with the high levels of spam circulating, ISPs often impose even stricter control over email, which tend to break many default email setups.
If you are having issues either receiving or sending mail, we're going to give a couple of test cases you can use to determine whether or not there is something blocking your access of our mail server. If you can try these tests out, you can then determine (in many cases) what the problem is for yourself.
Important: Before trying any of the following tests, make certain that any firewall software on your computer is temporarily disabled, or at a minimum is not blocking ports 25 or 110 (the most common email ports). For example, in Windows XP Service Pack 1, there is an Internet Connection Firewall feature that is located in the Advanced tab of the Properties (right-click) of the Local Area Connection entry in the Networking Connections section of the Control Panel (whew!). Mac users open System Preferences, select Sharing, click the Firewall button and go from there. Please check this before continuing. After you have performed your diagnosis, you may want to re-enable this feature.
I can't receive/get mail!!
Open a Command Prompt (MS Windows users should do: Start->Run->cmd) or a Shell Prompt (*nix variants just use an xterm). Type the following:
telnet mail.crosstecsys.com 110
within just a few seconds you should get a response similar to the following:
+OK cyclops.crosstecsys.com Cyrus POP3 v2.1.13 server ready < .....@...... >
If you don't get anything, this means something in between your computer and our server is preventing you from checking for mail on our mail server. The telnet command is a low level application that simply tries to connect to a remote machine on a specific port. In this way you are, in a simple way, doing the exact thing that your email program is trying to do, albeit at a slightly lower level.
I can't send mail!!
This is a slightly more complex situation. To send mail, your mail program must send the message to a mail relay. A mail relay is simply a computer that accepts your message and then sends it merrily along to where it is destined to go. Just like your local Post Office.
Why is this more complex? Because you have to make a choice as to what mail relay to use. Actually, some people can make a choice and some people have this choice made for them. In ideal situations, you would normally just use your ISP's mail relay, and everything will be fine. ISP's are supposed to accept all mail for any computers within their network. Additionally some ISPs (for spam reasons) refuse to allow you to designate a different mail relay than theirs (by blocking the SMTP port 25), thus the choice is made for you. You just need to find out what their outgoing mail relay is and use it in the SMTP outgoing setting for your email client.
If your ISP doesn't, for some reason, provide you with a mail relay, you may use our mail server as your outgoing mail relay. This will only work, however, if your email program supports outgoing server authentication. So basically in this situation, you can use mail.crosstecsys.com as your SMTP outgoing mail server and then enable the "this server requires authentication" option. The username and password to send mail is the same as those you use to check for mail.
Let's troubleshoot this quickly. Open a Command Prompt (MS Windows users should do: Start->Run->cmd) or a Shell Prompt (*nix variants just use an xterm). Type the following:
telnet mail.crosstecsys.com 25
within just a few seconds you should get a response as follows:
220 cyclops.crosstecsys.com ESMTP Postfix
If you don't get anything, this means that something is preventing you from sending mail through our mail server. Since we know that some ISPs don't allow mail relays outside of their network, this may be perfectly normal. Next you may try the same test with your ISP provided mail relay address. If that fails, you need to get on the phone with your ISP and have them walk you through making the connection.
Conclusion
If you don't get the responses indicated above, this indicates that something is blocking you from connecting to our server. In some cases, this is the firewall software that may be running on your machine (which we checked earlier and was turned off -- good). In other cases, your internet service provider (ISP) may be blocking incoming and outgoing mail requests through their equipment. The next step would be to check with them to see what restrictions they have set on your mail usage.
