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Connection to server imap.ntlworld.com timed out - (Thunderbird on a PC)

SimonHorner
Joining in

Hi,

I use Thunderbird on a PC to access my ntlworld.com email account.

Yesterday, on startup, Thunderbird says it is connecting to imap.ntlworld.com but it never makes it and eventually the message 'connection to server imap.nltworld.com' appears.

I've tried running Thunderbird in troubleshooting mode but this doesn't help.

No settings have been changed.

Anyone, any ideas?

Thanks in advance for any help.

Simon

6 REPLIES 6

coenoby
Very Insightful Person
Very Insightful Person

@SimonHorner wrote:

Anyone, any ideas?


I have a couple for you:

  1. Although the old ntlworld,com email servers are still operational, for the last 5 years Virgin Media have been recommending that all VM legacy email domains ( Blueyonder, Ntlworld or Virgin.Net) should be using the virginmedia.com SMTP and IMAP servers. See their recommended settings here: https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Email/Email-settings-change So it would be a good idea to update the server settings in Thunderbird before you go any further. (Note though that your email address will stay the same.)
  2. Just to check the problem is not with your VM email account itself, it would be worth signing into your ntlworld.com email account directly on the VM website. You can use this link https://mail2.virginmedia.com/  to do that. Enter your email address and password and see if it allows you in. If it does then you know that your ntlworld email account itself is working ok and the issue is with the SMTP / IMAP access. If you get an error post it back here.

If your get the "Your mailbox is unavailable......try again in an hour"error, which many people have been seeing, it means that VM have locked your account for some reason. In that case you should follow the advice that VM posted here https://community.virginmedia.com/t5/Email/Email-accounts-locked-mailbox-unable-to-access-email . That may well enable you to regain access via the Website and Thunderbird.

Hope that helps

Coenoby

I'm a Very Insightful Person, I'm here to share knowledge, I don't work for Virgin Media.

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Hi,

Thanks for the suggestions.

On 1)  changing from ntlworld.com to virginmedia.com doesn't help.  Now I get the message that Thunderbird can't connect to imap.virginmedia.com.

Interestingly, my wife uses Outlook on a different user ID on the same PC and she also can't access her mail - Outlook just sits there with the busy thingy rotating.

On 2) - I can access my email via the web interface without any problems and also we can access our email via our phones and tablets.

It's just on the PC that we seem to be having issues.

Thanks for your help so far.

Simon

coenoby
Very Insightful Person
Very Insightful Person

@SimonHorner wrote:

It's just on the PC that we seem to be having issues.


Ok, thanks for that.

The first thing I'd say is that the changes to the server settings don't just involve changing the server names to "virginmedia.com".

IN Thunderbirds's server settings You need to make sure you have the IMAP Port set to 993 and in the Outgoing Server Settings SMTP  Port set to 465. Also you need to have "Connection Security" set to SSL/TLS and Authentication Method set to "Normal password:

Assuming that you have already done that and Thunderbird still cannot access the server then I would test the access from your PC to the IMAP server..

Copy and paste this string

curl -v imaps://imap.virginmedia.com/ -u emailaddress:password

into a text editor and replace "emailaddress" and "password" with those for your email account. So that should now read something like

curl -v imaps://imap.virginmedia.com/ -u richardbranson@ntlworld.com:F99azxshgdf          (Make sure you keep the " : " in place)

Then type Cmd into the Microsoft Windows search bar (the 🔍 symbol) and open the Command Prompt app

Then copy and paste that amended string into the command prompt line and press enter.

If all is well, that should come up with a long list of responses which include a list of all the folders in the email account and ends with something like "Connection #0 to host imap.virginmedia.com left intact"

If you get an error such as *response reading failed" then post it back here.

Hope that makes sense. By the way I have MS Outlook on one laptop and Thunderbird on another so I have just checked and both are accessing the virginmedia.com servers fine for me.

Coenoby

I'm a Very Insightful Person, I'm here to share knowledge, I don't work for Virgin Media.

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Coenoby,

Thanks for taking the time to answer.   To cut a long story short, it's working again.     But I'm not sure what did it!!

I've been messing around, removing some apps that I don't need etc.   I'd noticed that Teams took ages to load, we never us the app, so that went.  I'd also noted that the search toolbar function wasn't working - strange...  the system fix for this didn't help either.

I even got to the stage of looking for new laptops, I was thinking that maybe the system was somehow corrupted.

Then I looked at Windows update to see if I could update to Win11 and noticed there was an update due to be installed.  

Anyway, after an update and reboot, I saw you email. First off, the search toolbar function was working again, it found cmd straight away - so something was better.  Ran your curl command and it worked - output all the directories etc.   And then thunderbird worked!!!!

So I have no idea which of the above made any difference - but I've saved myself £1k by not buying a new laptop    😄  

Thanks for your time

Simon

coenoby
Very Insightful Person
Very Insightful Person

@SimonHorner   So I have no idea which of the above made any difference - but I've saved myself £1k by not buying a new laptop    😄 

Great job, I admire your patience and thanks for coming back with the update.

Coenoby

I'm a Very Insightful Person, I'm here to share knowledge, I don't work for Virgin Media.

Have I helped? Click Mark as Helpful Answer or use Kudos to say thanks

Paulina_Z
Forum Team (Retired)
Forum Team (Retired)

Hi @SimonHorner,

Welcome back to our Community Forums! Thank you for your post, and I'm very sorry to hear that you've been experiencing some issues with your mail. 

I can see that @coenoby provided some excellent information about this topic and was able to help resolve your issue. 

We're glad that this is now resolved. If you need any further assistance, please let us know, and we'll do all we can to help going forward.

Thank you.

Paulina_Z
Forum Team

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