Is an upgrade likely to improve reliability ?

[seaneeboy]

Alan, if you're connecting through a USB port, usually switching to Ethernet will increase reliability loads.

If you're already on an ethernet card, it'll take a bit more thinking!!

[Alan Ryan]

Nate: My main grouse is the time it takes to authenticate e-mails. I seldom find that I can open Outlook Express and get reliable access to any e-mails I might have. Time outs are very frequent and even when I succeed with one e-mail account, the other nearly always hesitates for ages or times out.
I notice on this forum - which I haven't visited for months - that a lot of other people are grumbling about the same problem.

[Alan Ryan]

Originally Posted by seaneeboy

Alan, if you're connecting through a USB port, usually switching to Ethernet will increase reliability loads.

If you're already on an ethernet card, it'll take a bit more thinking!!

Sean: Yes I'm on a USB connection: I could switch to Ethernet and
get an improved service possibly. I'll think about it before making a move
though. Thanks.
Alan.

[Neil]

Originally Posted by Alan Ryan

Nate: My main grouse is the time it takes to authenticate e-mails. I seldom find that I can open Outlook Express and get reliable access to any e-mails I might have. Time outs are very frequent and even when I succeed with one e-mail account, the other nearly always hesitates for ages or times out.
I notice on this forum - which I haven't visited for months - that a lot of other people are grumbling about the same problem.

Alan-ntl's email 'service' is laughable at best, & one of the most unreliable around today-we have untold people posting here about it I'm afraid, so don't go thinking that it's just you.

http://www.cableforum.co.uk/board/forumdisplay.php?f=31

You are not alone I'm afraid....

It's also a regular on the ntl Server Status Page: http://www.ntl-isp.ntl.com/ServiceStatus/

[poolking]

Upping your speed won't make a difference to NTL's email service.

[seaneeboy]

Originally Posted by Alan Ryan

Sean: Yes I'm on a USB connection: I could switch to Ethernet and
get an improved service possibly. I'll think about it before making a move
though. Thanks.
Alan.

No worries, happy to help. If you want an easy guide to doing it, have a wee look here:

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/robin.d...mtips/usb.html

[nate]

The best way I've found of sorting the email problem is to get a new email address (Hotmail, or a free ISP, ie. Freeserve, Virgin etc.) and have all your ntl email forwarded to that address.

Even when the servers are down for POP'ing into, the mail usually still gets delivered.

I have all mine forwarded to my gmail account and it works a treat.

addition:
I would recommend Virgin or Hotmail too as they both have spam filters

[ppolo99]

Nate how u do the mail forwarding plz?

[Alan Ryan]

Originally Posted by nate

The best way I've found of sorting the email problem is to get a new email address (Hotmail, or a free ISP, ie. Freeserve, Virgin etc.) and have all your ntl email forwarded to that address.

Even when the servers are down for POP'ing into, the mail usually still gets delivered.

I have all mine forwarded to my gmail account and it works a treat.

addition:
I would recommend Virgin or Hotmail too as they both have spam filters

Nate: I'd be interested to learn how you've arranged for your ntl mail to be forwarded to an e-mail address at Hotmail or wherever. On these alternative
accounts, aren't you pestered by adverts ?

[Alan Ryan]

Originally Posted by seaneeboy

No worries, happy to help. If you want an easy guide to doing it, have a wee look here:

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/robin.d...mtips/usb.html

Sean - you're a very helpful guy; thanks again. I'm just off to the link you've provided.
Alan.

[Neil]

Originally Posted by Alan Ryan

Nate: I'd be interested to learn how you've arranged for your ntl mail to be forwarded to an e-mail address at Hotmail or wherever. On these alternative
accounts, aren't you pestered by adverts ?

You can configure all your email options here: http://www.ntlworld.com/help/custome...ilOptions.html

HTH.

[nate]

Originally Posted by Alan Ryan

Nate: I'd be interested to learn how you've arranged for your ntl mail to be forwarded to an e-mail address at Hotmail or wherever. On these alternative
accounts, aren't you pestered by adverts ?

My mail is structured very oddly, I have to admit.
If you go to http://selfcare.ntlworld.com and login, you can setup mailforwarding and forward it to any mail address you want.

My ntl mail is forwarding to my Virgin.net account, stripped of as much spam and as many viruses as it can pickup, then forwarded automatically from there to my domain email which has SpamAssasin setup, which strips the remaining viruses and spam from it (I forward it to Virgin first to lower the load on my server as I do get a lot of spam on my ntl address and I don't particularly want all my bandwith, which I pay for, to be used up by spam), it is then forwarded from my domain email address to my gmail account, where the last of Spam and Viruses are stripped and put into the Spam folder. Hence, I never get any spam or virii :p

So it goes..

NTL > Virgin > Domain > Gmail

(if you're interested, my domain mail goes differently..
Domain > Virgin > GMAIL)

I don't have to put up with advertisements as I don't forward it to Hotmail, that was just a suggestion to you as its easily accessible.

As I said previously, normally even when you cannot log into the ntl mail server because it is down, or timing out or whatever, the mail will still automatically forward, esentially taking the ntl servers and their current status out of the equation, which is great. Should't have to do it, as we pay for this service, but until Mx6 is deployed (the server upgrades) does the job

[Alan Ryan]

Originally Posted by Neil

You can configure all your email options here: http://www.ntlworld.com/help/custome...ilOptions.html

HTH.

Thanks Neil: I'll have a look directly

[Alan Ryan]

Nate: A very comprehensive reply: I shall see which of your suggestions suits me best. Thanks.

[Chrysalis]

thanks I setup auto forwarding wonder if it will be faster now