[Elecraft] OT: ISP problems

[Iain MacDonnell - K6IAM]

Dave Martin wrote on 07/10/08 01:29 PM:
>> No, Comcast is the worst, by far!  (:-))
>>
>> It's impossible for Rose to reach her case and cover customers
>> that are Comcast subscribers.  This is why you see an occasional
>> "broadcast" message from her to a list member.  From the customer's
>> viewpoint it just looks like she's not responded to a request, and that's
>> "bad for business". (;-)
>>
>> We have a number of Comcast subscribers on our personal mailing
>> list and their messages always bounce.
>>
>> Additionally ... for some ... an alternate ISP simply doesn't exist
>> and the only alternative is a dial-up ISP.
>>
>> 73! Ken Kopp - K0PP
>>    ElecraftCovers at rfwave.net
>>
> I wonder if those who are stuck with Comcast or simply persist in
> using it could get *all* their mail by using a yahoo or gmail account.
>  Is it just mail to the comcast email addresses they block or do they
> actually block traffic from other mail servers?  Maybe someone in the
> know could tell us.  I use gmail through my Verizon ISP and it does
> very nicely, with lots of features.

Certainly the web-based access to gmail or yahoo should work through
any ISP. Some ISPs, like PacBell..er SBC..er at&t DSL block port 25
(SMTP) outbound connections to servers other than their own (or
intercept them), to block spammers and worms, so if you want to use a
local client like Thunderbird, you might have issues. For gmail, at
least, that's simply worked-around by turning on SSL (a good idea
anyway), which uses port 465 instead.

     ~Iain