cPanel Reseller Tutorials – Email Tips, Tricks and Troubleshooting

In our last post of the cPanel tutorials series, Chris showed you how to configure your email client in a few simple steps. Today, I will present you with the second part of his guide, which contains several tips and tricks for the cPanel user, as well as an detailed troubleshooting instructions.

If you can’t find the solution to your problem here, please, contact our 24/7 support team for assistance. Have in mind that the more information you can provide for a certain issue, the faster and more adequate will be our reply.

EMAIL TIPS AND TRICKS FOR CPANEL USERS ===============================

• Mac Mail IMAP Note: The “IMAP Path Prefix” needs to be set to INBOX otherwise Mail.app will not be able to store deleted, draft or sent mail on the server.
• Once you set up your mail account under the cPanel Email Manager, you are given the possibility to download a special configuration file which will handle the automatic configuration for your newly created email account in the following Email Managers: – Microsoft Outlook Express 2000 – Microsoft Outlook Express – Mac Mail App
• At the bottom of the set up confirmation screen, you will find the Manual Settings needed to set up the newly created email account in any Email Application, not compatible with the auto-configure options provided by cPanel.
• IMAP email access coordinates with the server and you mail application. Messages that have been read/deleted/replied-to will show as read/deleted/replied-to both on the server and in the mail application. POP3 does not coordinate with the server. Messages marked as read/deleted/replied-to in the mail application will not show as read/deleted/replied-to on the server. This means that future downloads of your inbox or other mailboxes with POP3 will show all messages as unread.
• If you are to use secured connection (TLS, SSL), you will have to manually update both the outgoing port (to 465) and the Outgoing Mail Server to altarX.supremepanelX.com, where “X” marks the server, your account is located on.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ===============================

Should I use POP3 or IMAP based Incoming Mail Server?

In computing, the Post Office Protocol version 3 (POP3) is an application-layer Internet standard protocol used by local e-mail clients to retrieve e-mail from a remote server over a TCP/IP connection. POP3 and IMAP4 (Internet Message Access Protocol) are the two most prevalent Internet standard protocols for e-mail retrieval. Virtually all modern e-mail clients and servers support both protocols. The design of POP3 and its procedures supports end-users with intermittent connections (such as dial-up connections), allowing these users to retrieve e-mail when connected and then to view and manipulate the retrieved messages without needing to stay connected. Although most clients have an option to leave mail on server, e-mail clients using POP3 generally connect, retrieve all messages, store them on the user’s PC as new messages, delete them from the server, and then disconnect from it

. IMAP supports both connected (online) and disconnected (offline) modes of operation. E-mail clients using IMAP generally leave messages on the server until the user explicitly deletes them. This and other facets of IMAP operation allow multiple clients to access the same mailbox. Most of the e-mail clients support both POP3 and IMAP as protocols to retrieve e-mail messages; however, fewer Internet Service Providers (ISPs) support IMAP4.

In general, IMAP is always preferable when compared to POP3.

What to do when, despite you have set up your email client according to the tutorials provided, it still does not and retrieve or send your email messages?

1. Check if your Internet Connection is up and running.

2. Check if you have an Anti Virus Scanner or an enabled Firewall that is actively denying access to the following ports (25, 110, 143, 465)

3. Double check the account set up. Check the user name format which in all mail applications except for Thunderbird should either represent your email address or simply the email username listed in the email address prior to @yourdomain.com

4. If you use multiple SMTP Outgoing Servers, verify that you have assigned the correct one to your email account.

Once you have verified that everything of the above mentioned is as it should be, but you are still unable to send and receive emails, it is time to manually do the job the Mail Client runs in the background.

1. Follow the pattern –> click on Start / Run/ and type in “cmd” for Windows Users or run a terminal for Linux and Mac users (depending on your distribution search the menus on the desktop for the words “Linux terminal”, “Linux console”, or similar, and select the menu item)

2. Type “telnet mail.yourdomain.com 25” to telnet to the host on the port for sending messages or telnet mail.yourdomain.com 110 / telnet mail.yourdomain.com 143 to connect via the port for retrieving messages.

3. The results should be something like:

• * OK IMAP4 ready for IMAP for the command telnet mail.yourdomain.com 143
• +OK POP3 ready for POP3 for the command telnet mail.yourdomain.com 110
• 220 mail.yourdomain.com ESMTP Supposed MTA Day, Date Month Year Hour for SMTP for the command telnet mail.yourdomain.com 25

1. In case you see the above messages, the Mail Server is up and running and moreover – accepting your connection attempt at its best. Return and verify that you have an up and running Internet connection and that you are using the correct settings.

2. In case that you see a message like “Connecting To mail.supremecenter.com…Could not open connection to the host, port XX: Connect failed”, verify that you have disabled all firewalls and Anti Virus Scanners.

3. After you verify that all firewalls and Anti Virus Scanners are disabled and not currently active and you still cannot telnet to the host, your IP Address is most probably blocked on the Server or your ISP is stopping the connection on their end.

   In such case, contact our support team immediately, so that they can check the matter on our end. Bear in mind that you will have to provide them with the results of the tests you have carried out up to this moment and your IP Address (can be seen at http://whatismyipaddress.com) in order for the issue to be resolved faster

Originally published Friday, June 5th, 2009 at 3:22 pm, updated June 5, 2009 and is filed under cPanel Support.

Tags: reseller tutorials, reseller tips, cPanel, cPanel Support, email, pop3, imap4, mail client, ISP, SMTP, e-mail clients, email manager, 24/7 support, tips and tricks, troubleshooting

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