Connection being refused due to incorrect credentials?

Check the log file for MercuryI to see if it shows any entries that will provide a clue (e.g: password failure entries).  Might also want to enable session logging for a more detailed log.

My Mercury server was working fine up until last week. We had a blizzard here in the northeast and I lost power and was offline for 4 days. Power is back, but all emails sent to me are bouncing. Can someone help me figure out what is wrong?  My setup is very simple. I simply maintain half a dozen imap accounts for receiving mail. I do not use the server to send mail. I really don't know where to begin with this. I tried to look at log files. I'm not really sure which are the relevant files. When I looked at some of them, the contents didn't really mean a lot to me. That's the level I'm at. Thank you advance for your help.

How are you receiving messages into your Mercury server? Direct with MercuryS or picking up from a POP box with MercuryD?  If direct then check that the router and your DNS mx record are still set up correctly.

I assume that when you talk about IMAP accounts you mean you are connecting to MercuryI using an email client - is this correct?

Thank you for your quick response. As far as I know, the mail is being sent directly to my server. I'm not sure how I would verify this. If I look at Configuration -> Protocol modules the box for MercuryD is not checked. I have checked that port 143 is open and still directed to my server. I don't know how to verify my DNS mx record.

Yes, by imap account I do indeed mean that I am connecting to MercuryI using an email client. This has worked wonderfully for me up until now.

[quote user="rkatcher"]

Thank you for your quick response. As far as I know, the mail is being sent directly to my server. I'm not sure how I would verify this. If I look at Configuration -> Protocol modules the box for MercuryD is not checked. I have checked that port 143 is open and still directed to my server.[/quote]

That would be for IMAP from outside your network.  You also need port 25 open and connected through to Mercury for receiving mail.

I checked my router. It shows both port 25 and 143 being forwarded to my computer. I checked the ports opened in my firewall. Both 25 and 143 are shown as open. I checked the ports on the computer using netstat. It shows the Mercury core module listening on both 25 and 143 using tcp. I use the open port tool from Dyn to check both those ports. That tool shows port 143 is open but port 25 is not open. What does that mean?

[quote user="rkatcher"]I checked my router. It shows both port 25 and 143 being forwarded to my computer. I checked the ports opened in my firewall. Both 25 and 143 are shown as open. I checked the ports on the computer using netstat. It shows the Mercury core module listening on both 25 and 143 using tcp. I use the open port tool from Dyn to check both those ports. That tool shows port 143 is open but port 25 is not open. What does that mean?
[/quote]

I've no idea what the Dyn tool is, but if it is an external tool it appears to be showing you that port 25 isn't open to the outside world.  This could be due to your ISP blocking access, or that your IP address has changed and you are testing the wrong address.

Dyn is the company providing my dns service. They have a tool that allows me to check the status of ports. That said, I don't think port 25 is relevant to my problem. It is used to send mail and my server is only being used to receive email. So I guess the question for me is which log would contain any relevant information on why the mail is not being received.

[quote user="rkatcher"]Dyn is the company providing my dns service. They have a tool that allows me to check the status of ports. That said, I don't think port 25 is relevant to my problem. It is used to send mail and my server is only being used to receive email.[/quote]

Port 25 is used for both sending and receiving - it is the SMTP message port.  When sending you connect to a server on its port 25, and when receiving, an external server connects to your port 25.

[quote]So I guess the question for me is which log would contain any relevant information on why the mail is not being received.[/quote]

Do you see any activity in MercuryS window?  You can turn on session logging (in MercuryS) but from what you posted earlier about your port 25 not being open, it is unlikely to show anything.

Can you tell us what the exact error message is that is contained in the delivery status notification?

MercuryS shows no activity. The only window showing any activity is the imap4 server window. It has multiple entries of the form

Connection from (ip address), (date and time)

(username) at (ip address): xxx sec. elapsed, connection closed (date and time)

This happens over and over.

Subject: Delivery status notification

This is an automatically generated Delivery Status Notification.

Delivery to the following recipients was aborted after 5 minute(s):

    * (my email address)

Reporting-MTA: dns; qmta15.westchester.pa.mail.comcast.net [76.96.59.228]
Received-From-MTA: dns; omta08.westchester.pa.mail.comcast.net [76.96.62.12]
Arrival-Date: Wed, 13 Feb 2013 15:03:33 +0000
Final-recipient: rfc822; * bobk@middleearth.homeip.net
Action: failed
Status: 5.1.1
Last-attempt-Date: Wed, 13 Feb 2013 15:08:38 +0000

There is a bunch more mostly unreadable stuff below this. Let me know if it is important to see that too.

[quote user="rkatcher"]bobk@middleearth.homeip.net
Action: failed
Status: 5.1.1
Last-attempt-Date: Wed, 13 Feb 2013 15:08:38 +0000[/quote]

That domain doesn't have an MX record, and the A address (75.67.161.109) won't accept connections on port 25.

I've no real experience of dyndns hosting, but that configuration isn't right.  Can you confirm your IP address?

I have checked the address. It is correct. As for port 25, it is indeed blocked. I contacted Comcast support and they told me they do not allow port 25 to be open. Since this has been the case for some time apparently, I have to assume it is not the cause of my problem. It was working just fine when I shut the server down before the blizzard. Four days later it was not working when turned on again.

As port 25 is required for mail servers to communicate with each other I would say that is unfortunately a major part of your problem. You can open another port to allow clients to submit mail, but you won't be able to interact with other servers if port 25 isn't available.

As it was working before the blizzard it would seem that something changed in Comcast's environment around the same time that they may or may not be aware of.

/Rolf 

I'm trying to retrieve my emails from this account. Should I not be able to configure my mail running on the server to connect to localhost and/or the explicit ip address and be able to log in irrespective of external port blocking? When I try this, I get the message

Could not connect to mail server....the connection was refused.

How can I gain access to my stored emails? [:(]

[quote user="rkatcher"]

I'm trying to retrieve my emails from this account. Should I not be able to configure my mail running on the server to connect to localhost and/or the explicit ip address and be able to log in irrespective of external port blocking? When I try this, I get the message

Could not connect to mail server....the connection was refused.

How can I gain access to my stored emails? [:(]

[/quote]

Your original post only mentioned problems receiving emails.  Are you now no longer able to connect to your server via IMAP to read previous ones?

Connecting via 127.0.0.1 port 143 on the same machine running Mercury should work as it used to before - unless a configuration item has changed.  Connecting via your external IP address may not work from inside your network (unless you have a good router).

(Don't forget that new mails are currently not being received by any server, so are likely to be lost until the original problem is fixed.)

That is correct. I am sitting at the server right now and I cannot connect at 127.0.0.1 on port 143. I get the message I indicated previously. Any ideas?