Outgoing Mail server setting with two accounts?

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Level 1

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Outgoing Mail server setting with two accounts?

My wife and I both have Gmail and iCloud email accounts. So for each mail service both accounts should be configured to use the same outgoing email servers. When I check the Outgoing Mail Server for my account in the Edit SMTP Server window it oddlyshows her user name (full email address). If I change it to my user name, and then select her email account in preferences, it shows my user name. This seems to affect which account is able to send an email.

The user name for the outgoing server isn't being saved for each account separately. It just uses the last one entered. Yet the Edit SMTP Server window "In use by account...) shows both accounts are using the correct server. I've tried deleting accounts an re-creating but this doesn't help. How do I get the user settings to save? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

iMac (20-inch Mid 2007), OS X Mountain Lion (10.8.5)

Posted on Dec 6, 2013 9:49 AM

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Answer 1

Csound1

Level 9

60,063 points

Dec 6, 2013 6:29 PM in response to i2

Yup, it's important to remember that the servers are autonomous, you can login to the incoming, Imap server with one user ID and login to the SMTP server with another. Provided both ID's are valid it will work, but your reply will send from the account of the server you are logged into.

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Answer 2

Csound1

Level 9

60,063 points

Dec 6, 2013 11:24 AM in response to i2

Each account requires its own SMTP server, four accounts means four outgoing servers.

The appropriate server should be used by the account exclusively.

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Answer 3

Csound1

Level 9

60,063 points

Dec 6, 2013 2:15 PM in response to i2

You don't have to give each server a unique name, but it sure helps to identify which is which. As long as the correct one is attached to the account you could call whatever you like.

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Answer 4

Csound1

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60,063 points

Dec 6, 2013 2:16 PM in response to i2

The servers are not the same, your two gmail servers for example differ in that one has your wife's login, and the other has your login.

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Answer 5

i2 Author

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106 points

Dec 6, 2013 2:13 PM in response to i2

Thanks for your tip and it seems to be working correctly now. I couldn't find anywhere that said that. So you have to name each server differntly as you add it in the Edit SMTP Server window when you have multiple accounts using the same server. I'm not sure why since when both accounts used the same name, the window indicated each account uses the same server. All seemed perfectly normal to the user. But the user interface is misleading at the very least. This should be mentioned in the Apple Knowlege based article PH11765 on Outgoing Server Setup.

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Answer 6

i2 Author

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106 points

Dec 6, 2013 6:06 PM in response to Csound1

Csound1 wrote:

You don't have to give each server a unique name, but it sure helps to identify which is which. As long as the correct one is attached to the account you could call whatever you like.

The "Server in use by" (on one line in the window) showed both accounts as being used by the same SMTP server. This appeared correct but I had outgoing mail issues. When I gave a unique name for each account's server the outgoing mail worked.

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Answer 7

i2 Author

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106 points

Dec 6, 2013 6:10 PM in response to Csound1

Isn't the server "smtp.gmail.com" the same but the authentication (address and password) different to allow connection from different users?

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Answer 8

Csound1

Level 9

60,063 points

Dec 6, 2013 6:24 PM in response to i2

That is what I said.

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