# Sympatico issue with .Mac mail account



## Katsmeow (Feb 11, 2007)

Hi, this is my first post. Someone at another mb recommended this board. 

I have Tiger on my iMac PowerPC G4. I use Mac mail with Sympatico. Since late December, I've been unable to receive e-mail. I can send it out but nothing is coming in. I am able to log in to sympatico's site and check my mail there but I want my Mac mail running properly.

*I'll have to revise this*, as I was going to post my outgoing server info so I opened Mail and was prompted to enter account password and voila, the inbox started filling up. So technically, I have no problem...........except I have no idea why it started working. It's the 3rd time this has happened. The last time I didn't have mail for more than 2 months via Mac Mail.

I went to options on my sympatico page, checked the filters, they were still set on low. I checked my trash, draft etc on Mac Mail. I also checked my server info, made sure the account info was correct.

Does anyone have a clue as to why Mail wasn't working and how the heck it fixed itself? I didn't do anything but open Mail and it asked for a p/w.  I know it'll happen again and would appreciate any light being shed on it. 

Merci..........


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## Lawrence (Mar 11, 2003)

I've been having the same problems with Bell, On occasion my mail will ask for my password.
My guess is that Bell is having problems with their mail server and won't admit it.

It's been working off and on sporadically for that past 3 months.

Dave


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## IronMac (Sep 22, 2003)

I'd have been looking for another email provider a *LONG* time ago!


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## Lawrence (Mar 11, 2003)

IronMac said:


> I'd have been looking for another email provider a *LONG* time ago!


We are thinking about switching to Rogers for our T.V. and Internet,
Haven't decided yet though.

Dave


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## Gabbadude (Nov 17, 2005)

Do you have your envryption checked? I remember setting up a Sympatico account with Mail and it took me a long time to figure out.

I know it's documented (or was) on their website. 

Good luck


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## iMike (Nov 28, 2002)

I had problems with Sympatico not accepting my password all weekend. This coming suspiciously after I rejected a "Bellamarketer" who wanted to upgrade me to high speed from DSL lite. 

I will also be switching providers if service continues to be a problem.

Mike


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## Britnell (Jan 4, 2002)

I am having no problem with Swinepatico's e-mail service at the moment. the dotMac account works fine.


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## RunTheWorldOnMac (Apr 23, 2006)

I have only had bad experiences with Bell's internet. I was continually going to my parents and my aunts to fix their internet access. From changed passwords, to servers going down (and they never admit it...) I am with Rogers and have yet to touch my modem after 3 years. I am a happy Rogers customer; interent, hd cable, cell phone.

Cheers,

Scott


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## thatcomputerguy (Jan 13, 2005)

i use sympatico, have done for many years, and every once in a while i get the password error. have to shut down mail and restart the app and it is fine aferward. i have noticed that I seem to lose emails on my sympatico account, i've had some people ask me why i haven't replied, when in fact i never got the email. strangely though it seems all the spam gets through.

i have never considered switching to rogers though, you'll hear just as many bad stories about them to, so i figure better the devil you know.


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## Katsmeow (Feb 11, 2007)

IronMac said:


> I'd have been looking for another email provider a *LONG* time ago!


Easier said than done! I have a contract and can't afford to be paying monthly fees for 2 service providers. If I could end my contract without being penalized, I would. 

I live in Quebec but while visiting family in Ontario, they had problems with Rogers, technicians coming over at least 5 times. They switched to Sympatico for internet and thus far have had no issues.......wish I could say the same.

*Gabbadude* what do you mean my encryption checked? I don't remember seeing anything like that in my preferences.

Thanks for the replies.


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## thatcomputerguy (Jan 13, 2005)

Katsmeow said:


> Easier said than done! I have a contract and can't afford to be paying monthly fees for 2 service providers. If I could end my contract without being penalized, I would.
> 
> I live in Quebec but while visiting family in Ontario, they had problems with Rogers, technicians coming over at least 5 times. They switched to Sympatico for internet and thus far have had no issues.......wish I could say the same.
> 
> ...


i believe he is referring to "authentication" actually, which is in the advanced tab of your mail account settings. i know my sympatico account uses SSL, with password authentication.

hope that helps


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## IronMac (Sep 22, 2003)

Katsmeow said:


> Easier said than done! I have a contract and can't afford to be paying monthly fees for 2 service providers. If I could end my contract without being penalized, I would.


I didn't mean for you to have two service providers. What I meant was that you may consider a separate *email* service provider.

In my case, I do not use Sympatico for email but have accounts with Hotmail (not so good), Yahoo (decent but heard bad things about the new "beta" version), Gmail (supposedly pretty good), Mailsnare (good but I think they've discontinued their free version for new subscribers), and Fastmail (which has a free version and is very good).


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## Katsmeow (Feb 11, 2007)

I do have other e-mail accounts which serve different purposes. Hotmail sucks, I only use it when I have to. Yahoo is good when it works but they constantly have server issues.....I've had to wait for hours sometimes. Haven't used the beta version yet. I have Gmail, it's good enough but lots of sites won't permit you to use it for validating accounts, spamming was cited. Some of the sites I visit only allow ISP e-mail addies to be used. For my most personal e-mails, I've been using Sympatico synced with Mac Mail, old habits die hard.........

Thanks again.


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## Carl (Jun 7, 2003)

How are you checking your email? WIth a POP program like Mail or Entourage? Do you have the password saved for the account?
Why are you using filters on the Sympatico page. I have had Sympatico for years and have never gone to their site. Filtering is for PC users and would have no effect on Mac mail.
dotmac does have downtime, and some users are affected more than others. My dotmac account has never failed. You can't get dotmac mail through the sympatico website only through the mac.com website.

So it is difficult to offer assistance without knowing these details. If you just Google setting up dotmac with "insert your mail client here", you will find an answer. Plus, Apple offers decent support online for dotmac users.
Sympatico is just a pipe into the internet as is Rogers. I find most of these services equally unhelpful when you must call. When they are working though, they have very little effect on third party services such as mac mail.


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## Katsmeow (Feb 11, 2007)

I said in my first post that I use Mac Mail. The first time I had this problem, I called Sympatico and they suggested I check my filter setting via sympatico. It was on HIGH instead of the usual LOW. Once I changed it, my inbox was updated. Coincidence? 

My password has been saved but I've been asked a few times to supply it upon opening Mac Mail like two days ago. 

I've read in many places of people having similar problems. Thunderbird is something I'm looking into although I don't know much about it. Mac Mail gave me other problems before I was using Sympatico.........

It's working for now which I'm happy about.


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## Carl (Jun 7, 2003)

That filtering has nothing to do with dotmac mail. Yes, it was a coincidence. When you are asked for your password, it means that the mail server is down. If you login to dotmac, they list the outages. They are sometimes only 15 minutes long. In your case dotmac was down for a few minutes while you changed some filter at Sympatico. Maybe it filters spam in sympaticos mail servers, but you use a different port for dotmac mail and that filter doesn't do anything for you. Some users have been getting outages lately. It is mentioned on Macfixit.
I have never had any.
The problem you describe is not Sympatico related.

You may read about many problems on the internet. I fix computers for people. Most problems are caused by the computer user. Yours wasn't, but most people complain about things when it is simply something else entirely. Thunderbird, Entourage, Outlook, it doesn't matter what email client you use, they all work basically the same. Using one over the other will not prevent server outages. They all ask for a password when the server is down.

I have had cable and I have DSL now. I also have satellite TV, 3 phone lines and two cell phones. I hate all of them when I have to call them.
Luckily, we have some pretty smart people at ehMac, and you would be wise to ask all of us here before calling a first level tech with a binder in front of them.

Your password should be saved, and when this happens again, just wait 10 minutes. Anyway, it's working now. That's all that matters. At least you have a Mac. I would just get tired typing you through fixing your network connection on a PC.


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## Katsmeow (Feb 11, 2007)

As I said, I had other issues with Mac Mail before Sympatico. Yes, server issues happen everwhere, obviously. 

It works now My pass is saved until it isn't. When it happens again, I'm done with Mac Mail, it's not so impressive that it's worth the trouble. I just happen to be lazy about using another program.

PCs suck but they are good for something, some programs are available only through Windows. PCs are the McDonalds of computers, they're everywhere- not too good and you're likely to have a stomach ache.


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## Thom (May 10, 2005)

dolawren said:


> We are thinking about switching to Rogers for our T.V. and Internet,
> Haven't decided yet though.


Go for it!!! I did (left Sympatico) and wish I had done so years ago!!!!!!! Everything is better.. speed, email performance & support.


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## thatcomputerguy (Jan 13, 2005)

Katsmeow said:


> As I said, I had other issues with Mac Mail before Sympatico. Yes, server issues happen everwhere, obviously.
> 
> It works now My pass is saved until it isn't. When it happens again, I'm done with Mac Mail, it's not so impressive that it's worth the trouble. I just happen to be lazy about using another program.
> 
> PCs suck but they are good for something, some programs are available only through Windows. PCs are the McDonalds of computers, they're everywhere- not too good and you're likely to have a stomach ache.


when you say "mac mail" do you mean dot mac mail or just apple's mail program? what you are describing sounds like not necessarily a server being down, but a server being slow. sympatico servers get slow, a lot. apple's mail program has nothing to do with the speed of sympatico's email servers.


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