[Merged] NTL Email Issues

[greencreeper]

Originally Posted by Pem

Well there you go - NTL *are* improving the e-mail system - you now get a better class of error message. ...

[Toreador]

Originally Posted by greencreeper

In short, I'd rather deal with spam myself.

Fair enough but I think you're in a minority there

Originally Posted by greencreeper

We're addressing the wrong problem - a common mistake. Instead of addressing the problem of how to deal with spam once it's been sent, we should be ensuring it's never sent in the first place. It's easier to tackle the former but that doesn't make it the right problem to deal with, far from it.

But if you successfully deal with Spam once it's ben sent, you remove the incentive for sending it. In any case, I don't want to wait years for a "proper" solution (if such I thing ever arrives, which I doubt). Most other major ISPs have a solution right now, and I hope NTL will follow suit.

[markmarkymark]

SMTP server down or not working (again). I have tried to call about this - but this really is taking the p*SS - I fail to see that running a SMTP server by NTL is that difficult to achieve ....

I mean WHY is it so difficult to get right ?

[markmarkymark]

.. and whilst I am on the subject ... would anyone like to comment on this program :

http://www.postcastserver.com/

I really wonder if this is the way to go and bypass the NTL server ?

thanks for any comments or views

Mark

[SMHarman]

Originally Posted by markmarkymark

.. and whilst I am on the subject ... would anyone like to comment on this program :

http://www.postcastserver.com/

I really wonder if this is the way to go and bypass the NTL server ?

thanks for any comments or views

Mark

There was a thread on this last month

http://www.cableforum.co.uk/board/sh...light=postcast

Personally I've paid I-web 10.69 (well I think I have) for a years hosting and now use thier mail servers. Now if only i-web did news servers.

[Chrysalis]

yeah its never worked reliable enough for me threadbare, I dont use the address for hardly anything but it is in my outlook send/receive group so when I click it to download mails, I know its broken when the box pops up with the error, also even when it works I noticed the ntl mail server is slow at responding, I have 5 pop3 accounts used in outlook and 4 of them are almost instant at resonding and the ntl one always lags behind. I have done numerous test's sending mail from my hotmail account to all of my pop3 email boxes and everytime the ntl one takes days to arrive and the others take mins if not seconds, I have had occurences where email arrives from my sister at 2am on a sunday morning, which when I tell you she sends them from work where she does 9-5 mon-fri you then know something is up

When sending email it quite often has taken well over a week to arrive even if its a simple 1kb text message, and strangely enough my attachments seem to always get stripped off.

As far as my connection goes its pretty much good, I dont get slow connections to any other email servers, or other internet services so I pretty much assume its ntl's email servers, and judging by the other respnses here and that massive thread on the old nthellworld site then I know its an ongoing problem especially as I know ntl are setting up a new email server to try and fix it.

[Simcut]

yep got problems here.... what a load of ****e

[mnw21cam]

Originally Posted by Pem

Well there you go - NTL *are* improving the e-mail system - you now get a better class of error message. ...

Except that it is wrong. It lies to you.

The server has actually accepted the message, and will try to deliver it while telling the client that it hasn't. Of course, the client will try again later, which will result in the message being delivered multiple times.

This is a violation of RFC 2821, and should be beneath even NTL.

[greencreeper]

Originally Posted by Toreador

Fair enough but I think you're in a minority there

I don't think so and if I were it wouldn't necessarily make me wrong

Originally Posted by Toreador

But if you successfully deal with Spam once it's been sent, you remove the incentive for sending it. In any case, I don't want to wait years for a "proper" solution (if such I thing ever arrives, which I doubt). Most other major ISPs have a solution right now, and I hope NTL will follow suit.

Just seems arse about face to me. Do other ISPs have a solution, or do they have a system that inconviences the user as much as spam would?

[mnw21cam]

Originally Posted by greencreeper

Just seems arse about face to me. Do other ISPs have a solution, or do they have a system that inconviences the user as much as spam would?

Solution: Go to http://www.dyndns.org/ and set your machine up with a real fixed hostname. Then install Exim (http://www.exim.org/), and SpamAssassin (http://www.spamassassin.org/), and do your spam filtering yourself.

This does involve leaving your computer on all the time, unless you find someone friendly enough to provide a secondary MX server for you.

Originally Posted by mnw21cam

Except that it is wrong. It lies to you.

The server has actually accepted the message, and will try to deliver it while telling the client that it hasn't. Of course, the client will try again later, which will result in the message being delivered multiple times.

This is a violation of RFC 2821, and should be beneath even NTL.

I hardly think NTL wrote the e-mail software they run - and I also doubt they are the only people in the world to run said software. If such a problem was occuring it would be the responsibility of the software vendor.

[Chrysalis]

of course it is the responsibility of the end user to configre the software right, we can't assume ntl have configured it right, because something is wrong for sure.

[Simcut]

rubbish, NTL get everything else wrong :\

[Toreador]

and even if it's not NTL's fault and they can't be bothered to get the vendor to fix it - there are plenty of other vendors out there who could do it properly.

Originally Posted by Toreador

Fair enough but I think you're in a minority there

In which case I'm in the same minority.

Due to the nature of my business (if you don't know, follow the www link below!) I can't filter out (or have someone else filter out) messages that contain reference to, shall we say, "bodily parts" because it could be a spam offering to enlarge them or it could be a legitimate customer enquiry.

I appreciate, of course, that it's not the same for everyone, but such systems should not be applied by default.