Email troubleshooting, featuring MS Mail and Spectrum ISP

[mainer]

So I experienced a weird situation with my email, I noticed that I haven't been receiving any emails for a couple days, and when investigating I found that my account has been blocked from receiving emails, either by Windows or my ISP (Spectrum), I'm unsure. I'm just using the basic Mail Program that comes with Windows 10 (though I have been thinking about switching to a better one).

Clicking on my account name, I see an "action required" notice, clicking on that brings up this popup:

Needless to say, I hit "cancel", as I didn't want to take the chance in case I'd somehow had my email hacked. I'm not the most tech-minded person outside of a gaming environment, so I'm not exactly sure how to proceed, any thoughts or advice would be appreciated. I did a full scan with my AV, but that showed no problems. I haven't as yet contacted Spectrum tech support (I really, really hate Spectrum), but I may have to go that route. I don't click on email links from senders I'm not positive about, so I'm not sure how someone could actually change that pop-server certificate.

 

[Pifanjr]

So I experienced a weird situation with my email, I noticed that I haven't been receiving any emails for a couple days, and when investigating I found that my account has been blocked from receiving emails, either by Windows or my ISP (Spectrum), I'm unsure. I'm just using the basic Mail Program that comes with Windows 10 (though I have been thinking about switching to a better one).

Clicking on my account name, I see an "action required" notice, clicking on that brings up this popup:

Needless to say, I hit "cancel", as I didn't want to take the chance in case I'd somehow had my email hacked. I'm not the most tech-minded person outside of a gaming environment, so I'm not exactly sure how to proceed, any thoughts or advice would be appreciated. I did a full scan with my AV, but that showed no problems. I haven't as yet contacted Spectrum tech support (I really, really hate Spectrum), but I may have to go that route. I don't click on email links from senders I'm not positive about, so I'm not sure how someone could actually change that pop-server certificate.

The pop-server.maine.rr.com does seem to be the correct URL for Spectrum, so I would suggest contacting them, as this seems like they forgot to renew their certificate.

 

[ZedClampet]

So I experienced a weird situation with my email, I noticed that I haven't been receiving any emails for a couple days, and when investigating I found that my account has been blocked from receiving emails, either by Windows or my ISP (Spectrum), I'm unsure. I'm just using the basic Mail Program that comes with Windows 10 (though I have been thinking about switching to a better one).

Clicking on my account name, I see an "action required" notice, clicking on that brings up this popup:

Needless to say, I hit "cancel", as I didn't want to take the chance in case I'd somehow had my email hacked. I'm not the most tech-minded person outside of a gaming environment, so I'm not exactly sure how to proceed, any thoughts or advice would be appreciated. I did a full scan with my AV, but that showed no problems. I haven't as yet contacted Spectrum tech support (I really, really hate Spectrum), but I may have to go that route. I don't click on email links from senders I'm not positive about, so I'm not sure how someone could actually change that pop-server certificate.

It's probably not nefarious, but==and I don't say this lightly==you should just contact Spectrum. Personally, I'd rather break an arm than to call my ISP, but they should be able to resolve this fairly quickly.

edited to delete section on how to click on "continue" safely. @mainer if you really just want to click on "continue" PM me.

 

[Brian Boru]

in case I'd somehow had my email hacked

Very unlikely. As the guys said, almost definitely it's an admin problem for the mail server operator.

I see they're still using Road Runner stuff—that's the RR.com bit. When I was modding a hosting forum ~20 years ago, RR was by far the worst for general misconfiguration of their servers. Guess they didn't fire that admin yet.

 

[mainer]

The pop-server.maine.rr.com does seem to be the correct URL for Spectrum, so I would suggest contacting them, as this seems like they forgot to renew their certificate.

It's probably not nefarious, but==and I don't say this lightly==you should just contact Spectrum. Personally, I'd rather break an arm than to call my ISP, but they should be able to resolve this fairly quickly.

edited to delete section on how to click on "continue" safely. @mainer if you really just want to click on "continue" PM me.

What an F'ing nightmare. I've been trying to get Windows Mail to work all day Mon & Tues with no luck I contacted Spectrum Support, and after about 90 minutes (which includes one disconnect where I had to start over from the beginning with a new rep), nothing they told me to try worked, and the final response was for me to contact MS Support as it didn't seem to be a Spectrum issue (their words, not mine). I really hate Spectrum, though I may have already said that.

So I've been trouble shooting myself, doing a ton of web searches, but nothing I've tried has worked so far, and I just reached a burnout point where I had to get away from it for a while. Fortunately, I can at least access my email through the Spectrum Web site, which is a pain, but at least I don't miss anything. But I just can't seem to connect to Windows Mail.

I've even gone as far as deleting my accounts in Windows Mail and installing new accounts, as well as deleting the entire app and reinstalling it. Nothing I've tried works, and it's a bit frustrating because I know it should. Plus, there seems to be a lot of conflicting info on the web about what to do when it comes to server & port addresses, as well as different port numbers based on SSL being on or off.

My last 2 configurations are:

and

Anyway, not to bog down @ZedClampet 's weekly post any further, if you see an obvious error from those images, please let me know. Also, if you feel my posts should be moved to a different forum section for trouble shooting that's fine

 

[WoodenSaucer]

I haven't used an email client for a lot of years.

 

[ZedClampet]

What an F'ing nightmare. I've been trying to get Windows Mail to work all day Mon & Tues with no luck I contacted Spectrum Support, and after about 90 minutes (which includes one disconnect where I had to start over from the beginning with a new rep), nothing they told me to try worked, and the final response was for me to contact MS Support as it didn't seem to be a Spectrum issue (their words, not mine). I really hate Spectrum, though I may have already said that.

So I've been trouble shooting myself, doing a ton of web searches, but nothing I've tried has worked so far, and I just reached a burnout point where I had to get away from it for a while. Fortunately, I can at least access my email through the Spectrum Web site, which is a pain, but at least I don't miss anything. But I just can't seem to connect to Windows Mail.

I've even gone as far as deleting my accounts in Windows Mail and installing new accounts, as well as deleting the entire app and reinstalling it. Nothing I've tried works, and it's a bit frustrating because I know it should. Plus, there seems to be a lot of conflicting info on the web about what to do when it comes to server & port addresses, as well as different port numbers based on SSL being on or off.

My last 2 configurations are:

and

Anyway, not to bog down @ZedClampet 's weekly post any further, if you see an obvious error from those images, please let me know. Also, if you feel my posts should be moved to a different forum section for trouble shooting that's fine

Your second picture looks correct to me. You should open a free Gmail account and follow the steps there to import your email into Gmail and see if getting away from Windows Mail solves your problem. Even if you want, long term, to stick with Windows Mail, this would at least tell us where the problem is. You'd just have to enter this same info into Gmail.

 

[mainer]

Your second picture looks correct to me. You should open a free Gmail account and follow the steps there to import your email into Gmail and see if getting away from Windows Mail solves your problem. Even if you want, long term, to stick with Windows Mail, this would at least tell us where the problem is. You'd just have to enter this same info into Gmail.

Thanks, that's a better response than I got from the "tech" people on Spectrum Support (and that was from just doing web searches, nothing like what they actually told me to do). I think I may already have a GMail account that I haven't used in a couple of years, so I'll dig up my old user-name/password to see what happens.

It's not that I love Windows Mail, I just like the convenience of logging onto my PC, and with one click I can check all my emails then get on with my life. No complications, no logins. Maybe it really is a Windows issue, but my last Windows update was back on 8/10, and the problem didn't manifest until 8/17. But thanks, I'll give it a shot, probably tomorrow, as I'm too burnt-out to deal with it today.

 

[WoodenSaucer]

It's not that I love Windows Mail, I just like the convenience of logging onto my PC, and with one click I can check all my emails then get on with my life. No complications, no logins. Maybe it really is a Windows issue, but my last Windows update was back on 8/10, and the problem didn't manifest until 8/17. But thanks, I'll give it a shot, probably tomorrow, as I'm too burnt-out to deal with it today.

Well, you said that you haven't used Gmail in years, so you're probably not aware of what it is like now. If you have a Gmail account, you can just go to the web page, and it's basically the same as any email client. After you've logged in once, you don't have to keep logging in every time you go back, unless you choose to sign out. Because of how good Gmail has gotten, I haven't felt a need to use a different client. Not only that, but I even have it set up to fetch my non-Gmail work emails.

I have a bookmark in my Chrome bookmark toolbar, so I just open Chrome and click in the toolbar to go to my email.

 

[Brian Boru]

I may already have a GMail account

If Zed's "import your email into Gmail" is a one-off thing—but it probably is auto-repeating—what you should do is set up auto-forwarding at Spectrum, so all your mail is forwarded to your Gmail account as soon as it arrives at Spectrum. That's also a bit quicker than waiting for Gmail to import every time you go there.

Dump ISP Account

I used ISP email for my early net years, but dropped it ~20 years ago. Apart from variances in quality of product and service, it has one glaring flaw—you can't take it with you when you switch ISPs. I don't know if some ISPs still have storage limits on how much email you can keep in your account before you have to delete some to avoid "This account's Inbox is full".

Gmail and Outlook.com

Perhaps others are as good now, but these are the two I can endorse 100% from personal experience as the best there is—I've used both for business and personal email, G for ~15 years & O for ~10 years. I've just dumped Gmail this year as it got a bit too Big Brotherish for my tastes, but that's a personal preference, nothing against its excellence—altho I do prefer to get software and related services from a software company rather than an advertising company.

I haven't used an email client for a lot of years.

I haven't used browser email in a lot of years
Your solution is fine if you only have one email account, or don't need the convenience of one Inbox, Outbox, Sent etc—and you have fast internet.

For more than one account, a client is far more efficient. It's also always faster, which is quite noticeable either if you get a lot of email or have slow or spotty internet access.

Server

@mainer What's the ":1" in your server addresses? I don't recall ever seeing that appended to the port number—maybe try without it.

if you feel my posts should be moved to a different forum section for trouble shooting

Yeah, there are a good few posts by now, I'll move 'em to a new thread shortly.

 

[ZedClampet]

I've just dumped Gmail this year as it got a bit too Big Brotherish for my tastes

If you ever get bored and want to try something different, try ProtonMail. Very good privacy and security. So good that the Russian government blocked it. I just use it for my family and friends, but it has some nice features. You do have to log into it every time you go there.

 

[Zloth]

Untrusted certificate sure sounds like Spectrum dropped the ball and didn't keep their SSL certificate up to date.

Actually, does anybody have a mail client now? Try pointing it at pop-server.maine.rr.com and see if you get the same error. I expect the SSL overhead will get done before it starts asking for user name and password stuff.

 

[COLGeek]

Just to verify, is your PC's system time correct, including the timezone?

Do have trouble connecting to any secure (HTTPS) websites?

When was the last time you scanned your rig for malware?

Also, are you using a VPN or proxy service?

 

[Colif]

i have outlook but for as long as I remember I used the gmail web portal for emails. I guess I could set it up but I don't see point.

 

[mainer]

To all you who've responded, thank-you! There's a lot of good info here that will take me a while to digest, and I'm a bit burnt out with dealing with it after spending all of Mon & Tues trying different things (not to mention cursing a bit at Spectrum non-tech support). I will update as I sort things out, it's just that my non-tech brain sort of fuzzes-out after a while and I need to just play a game.

Untrusted certificate sure sounds like Spectrum dropped the ball and didn't keep their SSL certificate up to date.

Actually, does anybody have a mail client now? Try pointing it at pop-server.maine.rr.com and see if you get the same error. I expect the SSL overhead will get done before it starts asking for user name and password stuff.

Spectrum dropping the ball isn't unusual, and that could have very well been the initial problem. What's curious is that server address you mentioned, it's the exact same one that I've been using for 20+ years back when it was Time Warner Cable before Spectrum bought them out.

Original incoming mail server: pop-server.maine.rr.com, port 110
Original outgoing mail server: smtp-server.maine.rr.com, port 587

Here are some of the things Spectrum non-tech support told me to try which didn't work;
Spectrum Email Server Settings: IMAP, POP3 & SMTP (roadrunner-email.org)

I will update as I get back to it. Gmail may also be an option as I haven't really tried it in years.

 

[Zloth]

What's curious is that server address you mentioned, it's the exact same one that I've been using for 20+ years back when it was Time Warner Cable before Spectrum bought them out.

Yep, it was kc.rr.com here before I finally got to switch to Google Fiber. Stayed the same for many, many years.

Oh, there's the fix! Change of venue! C'mon down!

 

[Groter]

Just to verify, is your PC's system time correct, including the timezone?

Do have trouble connecting to any secure (HTTPS) websites?

When was the last time you scanned your rig for malware?

Also, are you using a VPN or proxy service?

This

had the same problem as OP cause of VPN

 

[Connoleib]

That sounds pretty frustrating to me. I had a similar issue where my emails just stopped coming through. After some digging, I realized my email list had some issues with invalid addresses, which was causing problems. I used https://bulkemailchecker.com/ to clean up my list, and that helped fix things. For your situation, it might be worth checking if there are any filters or settings in your Mail Program or contacting Spectrum to see if there’s a block on their end. Switching to a different email client might also help streamline things and avoid similar issues in the future.