Hello, I'm relatively new to exchange, so please excuse me. We run MS Exchange servers. We are having problems sending emails to some of the domains because of our reverse DNS records. The ISP suggested to use there SMTP servers, and I am having hard time to set that up. I found the following steps on internet and followed it, but I cant send emails after using that setup. I would greatly appreciate if some one can give me some comments/suggestions/feedback. "In Exchange System manager - find your routing groups section, create a new connector, SMTP. Name it something logical (ISP's SMTP Server, Forward to ISP as Smarthost, etc) and choose forward all messages to the following smart host- put in your ISP's smtp server there. Under local bridgeheads, select your server. In the Address Space tab, add the email domains you want (SMTP) - or choose * for all internet mail. Do not select allow messages to be relayed to those domains or you'll open yourself up to relay spam. Set up the authentication in the connector's outbound security properties. " Thanks

Is this Exchange server telnet to that smart host of your ISP? open command promt and do nslookup check what DNS server it is pointing to. also do telnet localhost 25 and see if it listening on port 25.. Vinod |CCNA|MCSE 2003 +Messaging|MCTS|ITIL V3|

Thanks fpr the feedback :) I can telnet to ISP's SMTP server, and telnet to localhost on port 25. Am I missing a step above ? And can we have two connectors at the same time ? Cause when I create a new connector, I dont delete the previous one (which is working fine).

What is the purpose of keeping the old connector? Vinod |CCNA|MCSE 2003 +Messaging|MCTS|ITIL V3|

Hi, I suggest you read following article firstly to understand the SMTP Connector in Exchange 2003 and which SMTP connector should be selected if several SMTP Connectors are configured in the Organization: Understanding SMTP Connectors http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa997032(EXCHG.65).aspx At this time, would you please let me know whether any NDR message is received after creating the new SMTP Connector to send all outbound message through your ISP mail server or the message stuck in the queue? In addition, I also suggest you enable SMTP Log on the SMTP Virtual Server to check whether any error is encountered when your Exchange Server connects to ISP mail server to submit messages. Mike

Thank you very much for the help, and sorry for long break. [Met with accident :(] Mike Shen: Thanks fof the link. I dont receive any NDR. The message gets stuck in the queue and reciepients never receives it. Vinod: The purpose of keeping the old connector is that I can always rollback to the previous configuration. Once the new SMTP connector starts working, I can always delete it.

Hi, From your description, I understand that all the outgoing messages should be sent to your ISPs mail server and relay to remote domain mail server. Whether I understand the requirement correctly. At this time, I suggest you check 1. Which queue the message stuck in. You can refer to following KB to troubleshoot the issue: How to use Queue Viewer to troubleshoot mail flow issues in Exchange Server 2003 http://support.microsoft.com/kb/823489/en-us 2. If the message stuck in the queue to your ISP mail server, I also suggest you enable SMTP log on the SMTP Virtual Server to check what error is encountered. You can also post the SMTP log here for further research. Mike

Hello, I tried to send emails without authentication and it worked. My ISP gave me a username and password and asked me to authenticate it, and that is why it wasnt working for so long. When I dont give any username and password, it works fine. I never thought it would be something like this which is blocking it. Thank you very much for your help.