Outlook Express Socket Error

[Sauron]

Hi,

Recently on my fathers computer, it stopped recieving emails. His internet works fine, I am actually posting this off of his system, but his comcast email refuses to work, the outlook claims a socket error, number 0x800CCC0E, its Outlook Express 6. This is supposedly a problem with the program itself, yet netscape which he also uses (don't ask, two email programs, both configured) are now neither of them working. His system is Windows 2000 Professional. About this same time, my mom is having the same problems. I called Comcast today, and as a usual "its not our fault, its Microsofts!" I called them, and left a message...yeah...anyways. I tried their knowledge help base, the telnet idea isn't working, 25 and 110 are not listening, any ideas what happened to these ports?

Regards,

[Tech Guy]

In a lot of cases this error has to do with your antivirus or firewall. Try disabling the e-mail scanning in your antivirus, or try disabling the firewall temporarily. 0x800ccc0E, and 0x800cccOF, are generally caused by this.

[Sauron]

Well, he has AVG enabled, so I disabled that, still nothing, do I need to uninstall it, then restart and try again?

[glc]

There should be a 5 digit error too - such as 10061. We need that.

Are you trying to use a 3rd party e-mail address by chance - something other than @comcast.net?

[Sauron]

That is it GLC, and no to your second question.

[Tech Guy]

I use AVG, an had the exact same problem, Double click on the icon down by the clock and goto the mail scanner tab. Just uncheck 'scan outgoing mail' and 'scan incoming mail'. Hope it works for you.

[Sauron]

Well, I tried that, nothing seemed to happen. I said screw it and uninstalled it. Email works perfectly now. Same with two or three programs that always had problems. *sigh*

[glc]

Now reinstall AVG - but go get the new free version 7 and go through the e-mail configuration carefully, it now uses plugins.