Mobile Broadband

[Thomas123]

I am using Microsoft Outlook 2012 for business purposes. I connect to the internet via my vodafone dongle. When I visited the vodafone shop near me they set my outgoing going server with the following: smtp.360.com and then set up my emails with the correct port and all that. All was sweet until today it stopped sending email altogether. I went back to the shop and they told me that they sold the 360 server to microsoft and were not able to help me. So now I have to use my own wifi in my house which is a pain and I need to be mobile most of the time.

Can anyone shed some light on this issue for me? I have look at other peoples problems and changed the outgoing server to send.vodafone.com and all the rest but it still does not work.

Very annoying.

Thank you to those who reply to me.

[Neil_Brown]

Whilst not true that Vodafone "sold the server" to Microsoft, the 360 server is no longer running. All this means is that you need to use a different SMTP server; Google's would do, although, if you have your own domain name / hosting for your business, there might be an SMTP server attached to that; this would be your best bet, to my mind.

[Thomas123]

Hi Neil

Thank you for your reply. We as a business are in the process of changing IT support. I called them this morning and they told me that they only deal with our incoming server.

When I am using my own personal WiFi I have changed the SMTP to blueyonder as my service provider is VirginMedia.This setting will only work on my wifi as soon as I plug my vodafone dongle back in it stops sending email. I have been advised to use gmail settings but the person told me that when I send emails that it would send from my gmail email address. Is this true do you know?

As you can see I am not very IT friendly and getting very frustrating. I really appreciate your help and support on this matter.

Thank you

[Neil_Brown]

This setting will only work on my wifi as soon as I plug my vodafone dongle back in it stops sending email.

Chances are this is because of the way the server authenticates — if you are not authenticating with a username and password, then the blueyonder SMTP server likely rejects the traffic, as possible spam.

What happens if you try the settings here, including entering your username and password?

I have been advised to use gmail settings but the person told me that when I send emails that it would send from my gmail email address. Is this true do you know?

I'm afraid that I do not know; since I use my own SMTP server, I have not tried Gmail's servers myself. However, it is a possibility, I guess.

[Thomas123]

Hi Neil

Thank you for your reply. I will check out the settings you kindly provided and I will let you know if I have any luck

Thanks again

[Thomas123]

Hi Neil

Just to let you know that I have tried the settings from your link and when I do a test email I get the following message

Send test e-mail message: The operation timed out waiting for a response from the sending (SMTP) server. If you continue to receive this message, contact your server administrator or Internet service provider (ISP).

Regards

Tom

[infared]

When you changed the settings did your email test still work with your wifi connection?  You shouldn't need to change settings just to use your dongle.

Are you using POP3 or IMAP?  An IMAP account may require different settings not shown in the linked artical.

I have sometimes had a problem with Outlook 2007 sending emails using my dongle.  I had to cancel the send and then re-send it and it worked - don't know why!!

[Neil_Brown]

You shouldn't need to change settings just to use your dongle.

I don't think that's necessarily true, unfortunately.

If you are using your DSL / cable provider's SMTP server, the native connection (i.e. connecting to the server from the provider's own address range) can often be done without a username/password authentication, since the native connection is, in itself, a protection against it being used as a spam relay.

If you wished to use the same server from a different provider, it is unlikely that the connection would be allowed, since it is coming from a different address range. To overcome this, the ISP will normally configure the server to accept incoming traffic (for relaying) where it is authenticated with a username/password belonging to a customer — hence why, connecting from a Vodafone range to a third party mailserver, I'd expect a username/password to be needed.

[Thomas123]

Thank you for your replies. I am using Microsoft Outlook 2010 which is a pop3 account. I am sending ok when I am connected to my VirginMedia WiFi and change the SMTP to blueyonder.co.uk. I do not need to put in a username or password with this.

When I then connect using my vodafone dongle the test message does not send. I tried putting in my username and passwork and the test message still does not work.

I really hope that I am making sense. I think I will have to pop down to the vodafone shop and hope that they will be able to help me.

Thank you again

Tom

[Neil_Brown]

I really hope that I am making sense.

You are — and it is unfortunate that the username and password is not making a difference. You might also try Blueyonder's technical support, to see if they have any guidance on sending email when not connected to the Virgin network?

[klyne]

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Neil_Brown wrote:

Whilst not true that Vodafone "sold the server" to Microsoft, the 360 server is no longer running. All this means is that you need to use a different SMTP server; Google's would do, although, if you have your own domain name / hosting for your business, there might be an SMTP server attached to that; this would be your best bet, to my mind.

As you have to register for a 360 account I wonder why Vodafone did not inform 360 users?

David

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[Thomas123]

Very Strange why they did not infrom 360 people. I made an appointment with the vodafone shop for yesterday. This appointment was made on Monday. When I turned up at the shop yesterday the IT person who I had the appointment with was on his day off. I do really wonder about "vodafone" as I find they are not helpful at all either in the shop or on the phone. Really think Vodafone need to look at the way they deal with customers.

Just a little update I am still having problems with outlook and nobody seems to be able to resolve the issue for me. Thanks to Neil for all his posts and suggestions really appreciated.

I do hope that someone from vodafone will take a look at this post and shed some light on the matter.

Tom

[Neil_Brown]

Would you mind posting the settings that you are currently using, so that I (and any others browsing) can see whether anything obvious springs to mind?

Please do not post your username or password, but it would be helpful if you said whether your username was an account name (e.g. your.name or some.other.identifier) or an email address (e.g. identifier@blueyonder.co.uk).

From some quick searching whilst waiting for dinner to cook last night, it seems that the SMTP server is definitely smtp.blueyonder.co.uk and that the log-in should be an email address, not just an account name, but, if you had this wrong, I'd have expected the server to have been clearer.

You could try port 25 for the SMTP server and not setting SSL (although I do not know what you are using now, and not setting SSL means that your traffic to the blueyonder SMTP server is sent in the clear), but do keep a note of your "working on Wi-Fi" settings, as the worst case would be to break everything trying to fix this!

Alternatively — and definitely one for ensuring you have your settings back up — you could try a different Virgin-operated SMTP server:

Server: smtp.virginmedia.com

Port: 465

Authentication: Yes, Same as POP

Security: Enabled, SSL, TLS (Not SPA)

A silly question, which I should have asked earlier, do you have access to this email account to send/receive from your mobile phone? If so, have you tried using the same settings as you're using on your phone?

[Thomas123]

Hi Neil

Thank you for your message. the settings that I am currently using when connected to virgin media wifi is the following:

smtp.blueyonder.co.uk

I have not ticked the box say requires authentication

And the port server is 25

i do not have it set up on my phone as I only have a personal phone.

thank you again

Tom

[Thomas123]

Hi Neil

Well just come back from the vodafone shop and yet again they were of no help. They never even looked at my laptop never mind my settings. I have come across this webpage and wondered if you would be able to take a look at it for me and see if it would be of any use to me. http://www.postcastserver.com/

I really appreciate your help in this most annoying matter.

Regards

Tom

[James]

Hey guys,

Many thanks for all of your posts and support on this thread.

@ klyne, we did try to inform all of our Vodafone 3go users via SMS and also by a statement when logging into the website unfortunately this does seem that some users may not have seen this message especially those who are mobile broadband users.

@ Thomas123, I’m not too sure about the service that you have linked to as it’s not something that we have ever looked at before.

As some ISP do have issues with allowing port 25 when using a Vodafone network connection I would advise also trying port 465 for pop3.

Please give this a go and let me know how you get on.

James

[Thomas123]

Hi James

Thank you for your reply, Much appreciated. If I change my port to 465 when connected to my vodafone internet dongle what should I be using for my smpt setting?

Thank you again.

Tom

[James]

Hi Thomas123,

This is the port for the Blueyonder SMTP that you have been using.

If you can give this a go it will give let us see if it is a port issue or something else that needs to be identified.

James

[Thomas123]

Hi James

Ok so I have connect my vodafone dongle and i have tried the following settings

smtp.blueyonder.co.uk

I have tried with the port 465

I have tried with my outgoing server(smtp) requires authentication

and I have tried the above without my outgoing server (smtp) requires authentication

None of the above works.

Regards

Tom

[klyne]

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James wrote:

Hey guys,

Many thanks for all of your posts and support on this thread.

@ klyne, we did try to inform all of our Vodafone 3go users via SMS and also by a statement when logging into the website unfortunately this does seem that some users may not have seen this message especially those who are mobile broadband users.

James

James

The problem is that some of us only use our mobile dongles occasionally with often big gaps between uses. A better way of communicating would be by e-mail or enclosing a note of the billing e-mail.

David

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