OS X: Mac Mail POP Stops Working

We had a call to look into why the built-in OS X mail client was no longer pulling e-mail into the inbox.

The 24” iMac was running OS X 10.5 (Leopard) with most of the recent updates.

The e-mail stopped flowing on July 9 at 16:45hrs (4:45PM).

Click on the gear near the bottom left corner of Mac Mail and then click on Get Account Info and the window that came up would connect to the POP3 server and list all e-mail on the server including any new e-mail not being retrieved.

Because the Account Info dialogue allowed us to connect and view content on the POP3 server, we knew that we were not dealing with an authentication or improper credentials problem.

A search for a solution to the problem took a few different keyword iterations before anything reasonably close came up:

• Tech-Recipes: OS X Mail: POP Suddenly Quits Working

Now, the above link deals with an e-mail that is malformed with a 0KB size that causes the stall.

In our case, the e-mail that was next in line, when sorted by date, had a 35KB size and was a broadcast self-addressed e-mail with a number of BCC addresses in it.

Somehow, that e-mail was causing the hang-up because as soon as it was deleted using the Remove From Server button in the Account Info window the user’s e-mail started to flow.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*All Mac on SBS posts will not be written on a Mac until we replace our now missing iMac! (previous blog post)

Windows Live Writer