jdandrea
join:2001-12-20
Basking Ridge, NJ
4 edits |  VPN no longer working, Laptop woes on the road
I have several email accounts that I access via traditional POP (or sometimes IMAP). Inbound traffic is just fine. Now, I also have their SMTP (outbound) configurations set to their respective servers.
As of yesterday, I had to change those all to mail.optonline.net, port 25 (default), no authentication. For my wife's desktop that's just fine. It's not going anywhere.
But my laptop does. Since there's no authentication on mail.optonline.net, I'm guessing they only allow connection from folks ON optonline's network. If that's true, I'm guessing I'll now have to change the profile for every account back-and-forth between optonline.net and the actual SMTP servers!
[update: that is true - at least from my tests, I can't connect to mail.optonline.net port 25 from outside of Optimum Online.]
What's more, I can no longer connect to my VPN, which requires port 500 (send AND receive), and one of port 4500 (standard for NAT traversal) and 10001. Right now, I am unable to connect to port 500, with the same symptoms as trying to connect to any SMTP port. (Eventual timeout.)
[update: Optimum Online support claims that port 500 outbound is not being blocked, but they did observe that I've got AT&T CallVantage via a D-Link box, so they suggested I take that out of the loop and see if everything works again. It's possible that the D-Link firmware was just upgraded, but that sort of timing would be incredibly uncanny, no?]
Is there some way to at least get an exception for VPN access? (VPNs are not always used for business either!) Also, for SMTP, will I be able to connect to mail.optonline.net using some form of authentication so I don't have to keep changing all my settings every time I travel and then come back home?
Reading Optimum Online's official statement, I'm at a loss as to why "Business" customers are not subjected to the same limitations. Their computers are surely no less vulnerable to attacks than "Consumer" systems, right? |
