Email server connection errors may be caused by blocked ports. If your computer is behind a firewall that is blocking ports 110 and 995, for example, then you will never be able to download email using POP3, regardless of the email program you are using! It is like putting up a barricade on the only road out of town. Identifying blocked ports early on during troubleshooting can save hours of frustration!

Windows Vista / Windows 7:

Click on the Windows start menu and type "cmd" into the "Search programs and files" field. Hit enter on your keyboard to run the program.

Windows XP:

Step 1: Click on Start, select Run,
Step 2: Type "cmd" in the "Open:" field and click OK.

The syntax of a telnet command consists of the following:

telnet <server or host name> <port number>

To test connections to Hover's incoming and outgoing mail server, we'll be using telnet mail.hover.com <port number>.

If you receive an error indicating that 'telnet' is not recognized as an internal or external command, then click on the following link for a tutorial on how to enable telnet: http://about.hover.com/enabletelnet

Port 110 is the default port used to download email from a POP3 server. Type the following command and hit enter to test your connection to mail.hover.com through port 110: telnet mail.hover.com 110

If the connection is successful, you should see +OK POP3 ready. If you get a connection error, then you may have a software or hardware firewall that is blocking port 110. This may block incoming email. Disabling software firewalls on your computer, or turning off any firewalls in network routers, may resolve the email connection error.

Type quit and hit enter to close any open telnet sessions with our mail server.

Port 143 is the default port used to download email from an IMAP server. Customers who use IMAP instead of POP3 should test their connection to our server using the default IMAP port. Type the following command and hit enter to test your connection to mail.hover.com through port 143: telnet mail.hover.com 143

If the connection is successful, you should see +OK IMAP4 ready. If you get a connection error, then you may have a software or hardware firewall that is blocking port 143. This may block incoming email. Disabling software firewalls on your computer, or turning off any firewalls in network routers, may resolve the email connection error.

Port 25 is the default port used for sending outgoing mail, but it is also commonly filtered by Internet Service Providers. Several ISPs only allow traffic through port 25 if your are connecting to their outgoing mail server. The screenshot above shows an error message caused by port 25 filtering.

Port 587 is a better port to use for outgoing mail.

The above screenshot shows a successful connection to our outgoing mail server when using port 587.

So far we've tested the following ports: 110, 143, 25 and 587. However, if your email software is configured to use SSL then it will use a different set of port numbers.

995 is the default port for POP3 when SSL is enabled.

An open SSL connection will display a blank screen with a flashing cursor. This is normal.

993 is the default port for IMAP when SSL is enabled.

Outgoing mail using SSL can use either port 25 or port 465. If your ISP blocks port 25, you can try a telnet to port 465 to verify whether the port is open.

If you haven't found any blocked ports, you might find the following command prompt tools useful for troubleshooting:

Type the following command and hit enter to check the IP address your computer is using to connect to our server: nslookup mail.hover.com

The nslookup should return an address of 216.40.42.134. If it doesn't, there may be a DNS problem that is preventing you from sending/receiving email.

A ping will test your round trip time and check for packet loss. Packet loss or high ping times (over a thousand ms) can cause timeout errors when sending/receiving email. Type this command and hit enter to run a ping: ping mail.hover.com

A traceroute is similar to a ping, but it will show you 3 sets of hop times through each server it goes through along its route from your computer system to our mail server. Type the following command and hit enter to run a traceroute: tracert mail.hover.com

An asterisk indicates a firewalled network router or packet loss. If you see very high hop times (over a thousand ms) or a lot of random asterisks throughout the trace route, then this may indicate a poor Internet connection to our mail server. This may result in timeouts or connection errors.
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