Help HELP!! Problems connecting to email server

[garybeck]

Help!

I am trying to get my mother in law set up on her new Galaxy Tab 2 7.0

for some reason the stock email app is unable to connect to the (comcast) email server.

it was working when she was here visiting for the holidays, but now that she's back home it stopped working.

I've tried everything I can think of -- including deleting the email account and re-creating it. I've checked the comcast server and port settings.

I even tried it from my identical Galaxy Tab I'm holding in my hand... it works just fine from here. I can create a new email account; it connects, and downloads her her emails just fine.

But when she tries it, she gets "can't connect to email server" and it shoots her back to the server settings.

I had her check that she has a good wifi connection by opening her browser and she can get google.com just fine (unless it's cached!?!?!).

is there any hidden setting that could be preventing her from connecting to the (comcast) email server?

any other ideas? help! thanks!

 

[Fox Mulder]

Make sure that other internet-connected apps on the tab are working. If none are receiving data, the wifi connection may need to be reset so try turning wifi off and back on, or toggle airplane mode (or power-cycle the phone).
If there are any other wifi devices using the same router make sure they are working properly.
Assuming the wifi is ok, go into the app settings and delete the cache and data for the email app, then try to set up the account again.
Those are some general suggestions, other than that no idea without actually seeing it.

 

[garybeck]

Make sure that other internet-connected apps on the tab are working. If none are receiving data, the wifi connection may need to be reset so try turning wifi off and back on, or toggle airplane mode (or power-cycle the phone).
If there are any other wifi devices using the same router make sure they are working properly.
Assuming the wifi is ok, go into the app settings and delete the cache and data for the email app, then try to set up the account again.
Those are some general suggestions, other than that no idea without actually seeing it.

thanks. I did have her check the internet connection before we gave up last night. she went to google and did a search and the results came up. Also turned off wifi and turned it back on, and verified that airplane mode is not enabled. I basically gave up at that point. I thought maybe a reboot would help, so I had her shut down and we'll try it again today. If you have any other ideas please let me know. I thought perhaps she has a typo in her username or password but she checked it a dozen times and the exact same input works from my tablet here but not on hers. Also the error says "can't connect to server," not "password doesn't match".

If anyone has any ideas of what else I could check please let me know.

if nothing else works, is there a way to restore the device to the factory original settings? that would be a last resort, but it was definitely working when i set it up right out of the box.

thanks

 

[jwither]

if nothing else works, is there a way to restore the device to the factory original settings? that would be a last resort, but it was definitely working when i set it up right out of the box.

thanks

Settings, Back up and reset, Factory data reset.

 

[garybeck]

any more ideas out there?

She can get email via the web browser but not with the email app. very strange.

 

[Little Darwin]

I would download another email client to her device, such as K9 Mail, and see if it works.

Have you tried connecting to her email from your LAN using her device? If it works on your LAN, and not hers, I would check her router to see if somehow a specific port or range has been disabled for her device's MAC address/IP (unlikely, but I would look anyway).

Even though it is not saying bad password, does hers capitalize her password?

 

[buffettgirl]

I had my standard email stop working on me and would not let me add it back in using the email button. It kept telling me my name/password was wrong, and then couldn't connect to the server. Finally I did a Manual set up of the account, ignored the 'error', and low and behold, it works now.

 

[dosnanos]

I've tried all this and nothing works. Manual set up, checked wifi, changed pop3 server to inbound.att.net and smtp to outbound.att.net port 465 (got these from att site) nothing works. VERY frustrated. Oh, gmail works fine.

 

[DoctorCAD]

Is she an Xfinity customer and not Comcast? My mother had the same issue, almost. She could hook up to the Comcast e-mail, but the mail would disappear from her screen. She had been moved to Xfinity without realizing there was any difference.

Eventually, she realized that there is an Xfinity app available that she loaded and now has email and caller ID and can even listen to her voicemail on the tablet.