Can't download messages suddenly .... problem with connectio

[bulla]

I successfully transferred emails from my Windows computer to my imac, and for a few days I was downloading emails with no problem.

Today I turned on the computer and I was unable to download my email providers messages - only hotmail. The message I got was ....


Error with account

Unable to establish TLS connection to POP3 server. The server may be down or may be incorrectly configured. Please verify the correct configuration in the Server Settings for your mail server in the Account Settings window and try again.


I looked at the settings and sure enough, my provider's email account is set up with POP mailserver, and the server name is "pop3.abcxyzetc.com" abcxyzetc is my email provider and that's OK. I can't get POP emails because I'm able to download hotmail emails onto my hard drive

I didn't change anything before I transferred it over, or after. Unfortunately I can't look it up on the Windows computer anymore to see if it was set up this was before the transfer or if it was changed somehow on the transfer over.


What's happened overnight that I can't download my messages anymore?

I don't want to create a new email profile because I have about 7 email accounts and I don't want to create a new one that will appear at the bottom of everything, especially since the others rarely get any activity. Or if I have to create a new one, is there a way of creating it as the FIRST email program out of all of them? In the past I'm pretty sure I wasn't able to do this .....

Thanks - hope someone can help me!!

[DanRaisch]

It's not clear from your post what Hotmail has to do with anything relating to your email provider's POP account. Or are you just saying that you are getting messages from the Hotmail account but not from the provider's?

Who is the provider? Have you checked with them to see if they have made any changes to the settings required to access their servers?

Without divulging your e-mail address or account name, what are your server settings, including server name, port number, and choices for "Connection security" and "Authentication method" under Tools>Account Settings>Server Settings for
Server Name
Port
Connection Security
Authentication Method

Any recent changes in your computer or software configuration that might be relevant?
(including OS or Thunderbird updates, adding extensions or themes, etc. and any security program updates)

[bulla]

Thanks Dan - yes, you're right, I only mentioned hotmail just to show that I could still download messages for another account - so it was just my provider's emails.

The provider hasn't changed anything because there's another computer in the house and they haven't had any problems. Since I was able to download messages yesterday would there be a reason why the account and server details etc etc would need changing?

I DID instal a program yesterday but I'm pretty sure it was during the day and that I'd downloaded messages after I'd isntalled it. It was the "MyPopbarrier" .. you download emails on the server and then remove any you want before you download them onto your hard drive. I've had it on the computer before, plus it was working today and had no server problems.

http://download.cnet.com/MyPopBarrier/3 ... 00656.html

I don't think there's been any Thunderbird updates (but they get done autoimatically so I wouldn't know)

Thanks Dan

[DanRaisch]

Are there messages on the server that have downloaded to the one computer but not to the one with problems?
If you uninstall that "MyPOPBarrier" program can you then receive messages in Thunderbird? (There was an updated to that program noted on the URL you provided. Ay changes to the system could cause issues, although I''m not pointing to that program as the actual cause of this issue, just something to evaluate.)

[bulla]

Thanks Dan.

I don't understand what you mean by "server" ...... but we can download the provider's email (another user name) on the other computer. I just can't download my provider's email on this computer - I've tried the 3 email addresses I have and get the same message.

I uninstalled "MyPopBarrier" and it didn't help at all ..... I've still got the same error message when I try to download my provider's email messages.

But after I took note of my servers and security settings .... I compared them to those of the hotmail, and besides the server differences, the "connection security" was different - I had STARTTL and the hotmail one was SSL/TLS ...... so I changed the provider connection security to SSL/TLS and voila ..... I could download the messages!!!

Dan, in terms of the "Connection security" - can you tell me what the difference is between

STARTTLS, and
SSL.TLS

??? Is it OK for me to have changed it? Has it reduced the security in any way?

Thanks Dan!

[DanRaisch]

By "server" I'm referring to the email provider's system that you can access using a browser to see what is on their side of the connection. Being able to access messages from a different account (user name) on another computer doesn't really tell you anything at al about the status of your account or Thunderbird's ability to access data from that account.

As far as connection security, it's technical, but if you are interested, see this thread -- viewtopic.php?f=39&t=2730845

[bulla]

Thanks Dan - thanks for the help.

I didn't understand anything about the connection security except where it says that as long as you have a password to access your email then it's OK.