Outlook Express fails to retain POP3 settings

[BoeingBoy]

I'm posting this for a friend.

He has a new PC that has allowed him to check his mail without problems but in the last week has found that he cannot access his email account without finding that the POP3 incoming mail has defaulted from 'mail.btopenworld.com' to 127.0.0.1 in the POP3 inbound mail box.

He can reset things back to normal and check his account without problems but on restart finds that the 127.0.0.1 has returned to the inbound mail setting.

Running Spybot had revealed some spyware that was placing registry entries in internet settings but removing these has not corrected the problem.

Any help would be apprieciated.

BB

[Coconutty]

Hi BoeingBoy,

Not come across this before but 127.0.0.1 is a "Loopback network connection" :ooh:

In other words it's a bit like talking to yourself !

Hopefully some of the following might help or at least give more of a clue as to what's going on....

You need to check your e-mail account settings :

Start Outlook Express, Click on Tools / Accounts and then the "Mail" tab.

Click once on your e-mail account name to highlight it then click "Properties" and then the "Servers" tab.

If you see 127.0.0.1 in either the Incoming mail ( POP3 ) box or Outgoing mail (SMTP) box then this explains the problem ( but not why it happened ) and it should be changed back to your Service providers settings.
You can usually get these from your ISP's web site and will be something like POP3.btopenworld.com & SMPTP.btopenworld.com etc.
( Check with BT - these might not be the same as yours ).

Change them if needed, click OK then Close the window.
Close Outlook Express and restart it.
See if e-mail now works - If it does :D

If not go back through the above procedure and if the settings you entered have changed,
like back to the 127.0.0.1 then you may have a virus :* that is doing this and you need to run the latest virus scanning utility.

If from the outset the settings appear OK you could try removing your e-mail account from Outlook Express ( Tools / Accounts / Mail / Remove ) and then adding it again using the correct settings from your ISP.

If none of this works then maybe someone else will come with some ideas !
( It could also have something to do with firewall settings ).

Good Luck :ok:

Coconutty :ooh:

[BoeingBoy]

Thanks Coco, yes, all the above have been covered but thanks for your help.

We think we may have found a solution on micronet that centres on intereferance by anti virus software, but I wait to hear from my friend the outcome of the fix.

Thanks again.

BB

[BOAC]

BB - I´m away from the home machine at the moment, but I think a programme called 'YahooPops' which allows OE to collect Yahoo non-pop3 mail is just one which uses the 'local' IP - has he used that?