Hi Brenda:

Yes, as pasa pointed out his problem was not Windows config problems but rather was due to dynamic DNS assigning him an IP address that was blocked by his mail provider Go Daddy (because previously a spammer had used that IP address). When pasa's IP address changed (after he asked his ISP to drop his current IP address and give him another IP addrss), he received a new one that wasn't blocked by Go Daddy and then he could send email using Go Daddy's outgoing SMTP email server.

Full details:
http://getsatisfaction.com/mozilla_me...

Anyhow Brenda, you didn't give us enough info to help you.

Please reply with complete details as requested in our README (Thunderbird version (2.0.0.23?), Operating System (Windows XP?), ISP, mail service provider (are your ISP and Mail Provider both Comcast?), outgoing SMTP mail server settings (should be port 587 according to Comcast documentation, exact error message, etc)

Hi Brenda:

It might be a DNS problem but it's not clear. To help you further we need more info on what exactly the problem is. No need to hire a "geek", just need to figure out what exactly is working and what is not working and to post that info here. Also please don't type your replies in all upper case. All upper case doesn't help and doesn't make things faster :-)

You wrote:

to give you an example.....i have 2 friends who use Verizon...they live next door to each other...1 gets my e-mail..the other does not....it is only my Verizon friends...out of the 20...3 receive my e-mails......the really strange thing is this: over the past 6 months, this has happened at least 3 times....i.e. they got the mail say in August...in October...it started all over again! My daughter in Nashville with the @mindspring address no longer gets my e-mails.......she did until around the 1st of Oct. All the rest of my 50-60 friends receive with no problem. Truly an interesting problem! Thanks so much for your input!..................Brenda P.S. 2 of my friends called Verizon....Verizon came onto their puters and looked......said they were not blocking me in any way that Verizon could see. Also, I can reach ALL these people if I send by Comcast e-mail, rather than Mozilla.

So to summarize in what I hope is very clear to all, here is the problem:

Please answer the questions in the problem summary below as well as provide your SMTP settings as requested at the end
1. You can receive email using Thunderbird from verizon.net email addresses and all other email addresses. the problem is only with sending verizon.net and @mindspring email addresses. Please confirm
2. Your Internet Service Provider is Comcast Please confirm. This is important if you are using another ISP to send out Comcast email then this could be causing the problem
3. Your mail service provider is Comcast i.e. your email account is something with a comcast email address e.g. brenda@comcast.com, Please confirm by telling us what your email address is but change it slightly so if it's brenda@comcast.com change it to brnda@comcast.com
5. For 17 of 20 friends on Verizon, you cannot send email to people with verizon.net email addresses using Thunderbird, but if you send email to the same 17 verizon.net email addresses using Comcast webmail, 100% of the time it works. Please confirm
3. Same thing with your daughter's email address at mindspring i.e. 100% of the time, you cannot send email to her with @mindspring email addresses using Thunderbird, but if you send email to the same @mindspring email addreses using Comcast webmail, 100% of the time it works. Please confirm
4. All other outgoing email (to roughly 40 other people) to other email addresses work from Thunderbird 100% of the time. e.g. you can send email to @hotmail.com or @gmail.com from Thunderbird using your Comcast email account and it works every time. Please confirm. This too is important

CONCLUSION for now (subject to confirmation that I asked for above): Not a Thunderbird problem

DETAILS:Since it's only happening for 20 out of your 60 friends, it sounds like a problem with the COMCAST SMTP Server and possibly the SMTP Server's DNS. SMTP is the the name for protocol used to send email. DNS is the internet protocol used for SMTP servers to talk to find other email providers.

Webmail doesn't use SMTP and DNS so that's why it is working. Just because webmail works doesn't mean Thunderbird isn't working (unfortunately).

Thousands of people use COMCAST and Thunderbird to send out email without problems so it's probably not a Thunderbird Problem

Please give your Outgoing SMTP Server Settings and double check with Comcast that they are correct

So assuming the above doesn't help, the next thing to do is to tell us your Outgoing SMTP Server Settings in Thunderbird.
[ a nice explanation with screenshots is here: http://www.freeemailtutorials.com/moz... ]

You can do this from Tools->Account Settings->Outgoing Server (SMTP)
Select the Server that corresponds to your outgoing COMCAST server and click "Edit" and then please tell us the settings for:
i)Server Name
ii) Port
iii) Is "Use name and password" checked?
If so what is the "User Name"?
and what is selected under "Use secure connection"?
"No", "TLS if available", "TLS" or "SSL?
Apologies if this is too technical for you. Please find somebody who can help you out if it is too technical.

Hi Brenda:

What Pasa is suggesting (if email is blocked, send the blocked email through another provider like gmail) may work but it also may not work. It may not work because the other provider may block outgoing email that doesn't use an outgoing address from them e.g. mail provider "foo.com" may disallow email with from addesses of "comcast.com"

I believe gmail will allow you to set the from to "comcast.com" and send outgoing email using gmail's server, but you have to do some verification first and here are the verification docs:
https://mail.google.com/support/bin/a...