Help - "The Hotmail POP server “pop3.live.com” rejected the password"

[cys920622]

Every few minutes, my Mail rejects my Hotmail password and says "The Hotmail POP server “pop3.live.com” rejected the password for user ______". I looked it up on google and apparently hotmail may be set up to reject passwords or deny POP access if the polling rate is too fast... I'm not sure what's going on. I click "remember password in keychain" every time but it pops up every hour at least. It's driving me insane, but I really like the mail app. Help?
Thanks

[FourCandles]

Have you looked in Keychain Access to see if there are duplicate entries for pop3.live.com?

[Relentlos]

I've been having the same issue now that hotmail allows you to setup with mail clients, but only seems to offer a guide for outlook express.


I've got the info correct (as far as I know:
Incomming: pop3.live.com
Outgoing: smtp.live.com

Incoming port 995, SSL checked, got my password is correct.
Outgoing port 25, SSL checked, password is correct.


It doesn't seem to happen every time it checks, but it is becoming an annoyance.



edit:
Based off what the OP said, I've changed mail.app's settings to check for new mail every 15 minutes instead of every 5 minutes. Lets see how that works out.

[andalusia]

This happens to me too, has done for many months, and I've been unable to find a diagnosis/cure. It does it randomly too - sometimes it remembers the password, sometimes it doesn't.

[srl7741]

It happens to me also and then I started wondering why I even keep the email address or Hotmail account.

I've never used it and had it since it was first introduced. I have never made any changes to the account info nor made any changes to the settings on the iPhone. Sometimes it kicks those error message out and then all the sudden they go away.

I've never looked for a solution and was just posting to support having the same issues.

[Relentlos]

I checked keychain access, and saw multiple entries, so I deleted them all to start fresh. Hopefully that, plus the fewer connections to the server over time will prevent the issue from happening.


Anyone else occasionally get a warning that it could not authenticate the server's certificate?

[cys920622]

I checked Keychain Access and there is only one entry for pop3.
I considered delaying my hotmail refresh but changed my mind because I want my email to come ASAP.

[Relentlos]

Originally Posted by cys920622

I checked Keychain Access and there is only one entry for pop3.
I considered delaying my hotmail refresh but changed my mind because I want my email to come ASAP.

Well so far I've had no trouble with 15 minute intervals. E-mail is not always instant anyway, so 15 minutes is no trouble at all.

I'm think it also checks when you activate the application, and of course when you click "get mail". If you're expecting an e-mail, you could always just check it manually.

So far it seems to be working with 15 minute intervals, but I'll have to keep it running all night to see for sure.

[cys920622]

Originally Posted by Relentlos

Well so far I've had no trouble with 15 minute intervals. E-mail is not always instant anyway, so 15 minutes is no trouble at all.

I'm think it also checks when you activate the application, and of course when you click "get mail". If you're expecting an e-mail, you could always just check it manually.

So far it seems to be working with 15 minute intervals, but I'll have to keep it running all night to see for sure.

Thanks, let me know if this works. I just pressed "Get Mail" about 30 times in succession, letting it load completely in between presses, and it hasn't rejected me yet, and I'm still on the 5 min schedule, so I'm almost starting to believe that these rejections are random...

[Relentlos]

Hm, well 15 minute intervals appear to be working somewhat, however sometime during the night, or in the morning, it rejected the password to one of my hotmail accounts. The other was fine.

I re-entered the password, and it hasn't acted up since, but it seems it's definitely something on microsoft's end. Maybe when high traffic hits the site, the server gets overloaded? Who knows.



edit: as for your 30 times in succession, it may not count as 30 separate times. You may be logged in, and it would count as if checking your inbox 30 times under one session, where as within 5 minutes of inactivity, it disconnects you, and mail.app tries to re-connect.

[CrzyGoatlady]

I can't send anything today because of the "The Hotmail POP server “pop3.live.com” rejected the password" issue. Did you all find a solution? I don't know how to check my keychain - if indeed that is the issue at all.

[Relentlos]

There appears to be no absolute solution.

I currently have mine set to check every hour, and with that, I get much less rejections, but it occasionally still happens. All I really have to do is enter the password, or hit cancel, right click the mailbox and "get mail" on it since the application already has the password. Of course you should wait a bit before doing that or it may reject again.


Keep in mind that every hour isn't that bad. Sure you want mail ASAP, but e-mail isn't always instant. Waiting an hour to get an e-mail should be no problem for anyone, and if you happen to be expecting one within the next few minutes, you can simply click "get mail" to check manually.

[ikaribear]

Hi,

For years, I have used Mail to download my email and even though I've had to use 3rd party programs in the past, months ago I discovered this was possible without 3rd party program.

After having my hotmail account hacked I changed my password to something a bit more complex. The hacking finished and the Mail problems started (I didn't associate one with the other at the time).

My hotmail sync stopped working and I started getting the error "The POP server “pop3.live.com” rejected the password for user ..." well, I tried a number of things (highlighted in the forum) but nothing worked. I gave up and moved on. I started checking my hotmail through the browser instead. Today I decided that enough was enough and so tried again.

I found a few solutions on the several websites and forums but nothing worked until I decided to change me password to a shorter password. I went from 17 characters to 14 characters.

... problem solved.

I hope this is useful.

P.

[Apple-Guy]

Originally Posted by ikaribear

Hi,

For years, I have used Mail to download my email and even though I've had to use 3rd party programs in the past, months ago I discovered this was possible without 3rd party program.

After having my hotmail account hacked I changed my password to something a bit more complex. The hacking finished and the Mail problems started (I didn't associate one with the other at the time).

My hotmail sync stopped working and I started getting the error "The POP server “pop3.live.com” rejected the password for user ..." well, I tried a number of things (highlighted in the forum) but nothing worked. I gave up and moved on. I started checking my hotmail through the browser instead. Today I decided that enough was enough and so tried again.

I found a few solutions on the several websites and forums but nothing worked until I decided to change me password to a shorter password. I went from 17 characters to 14 characters.

... problem solved.

I hope this is useful.

P.

I wen trough aaaall the trouble of registering just to say;

THANKS!

This fixed my password change too

Greetz Apple-Guy

[Spider-Man]

Originally Posted by ikaribear

I found a few solutions on the several websites and forums but nothing worked until I decided to change me password to a shorter password. I went from 17 characters to 14 characters.

... problem solved.

I hope this is useful.

P.

Hi Ikaribear & all. Unfortunately - you may have just been lucky. I am experiencing the issue with a hotmail password shorter than 14 characters, so this does not solve the problem. Also, for those reporting that the issue occurs "less frequently" when lowering frequency from 5 to 15mn - logically, if you're checking emails x3 less often, then the issue is going to occur x3 less often, so that doesn't seem to be valid either.

This is seriously annoying. Could this be deliberate either on Apple's or Microsoft's part? I'll keep looking and report back if I find anything.

Cheers.

[weintrw]

I have the same annoying problem of feeling rejected by pop3. I have tried all the fixes but it's back like a rash. I have one thing to maybe add. About once every few days Mac OS gives me a popup that says it suspects msn.com is a rogue site with bad intentions suggests not letting msn send me any mail or anything. Is it possible this is corporate fighting with neither side trying to fix the miscommunication?

[magjg]

I've been having the same problem for a long time now and only recently decided to do something about it. The latest solution I've tried was changing the "Outgoing Mail Server (STMP):" from 'stmp.live.com...' to 'stmp.hotmail.com'.

This can be done by going to
(1) "Mail"
(2) "Preferences"
(3) "Accounts"
(4) And under "Account Infomation" at the bottom should be "Outgoing Mail Server (STMP)"
(5) If you select "Edit STMP server list" from the drop down menu
(6) And under "Server Name" change 'stmp.live.com' to 'stmp.hotmail.com'

not certain it will work for you but it seems to be working for me.

[weintrw]

Thanks Magig:

I made the change and have gotten mail thru msn and no pw requests so far. Time will tell. I am not sure how this could work. When I entered it now says hotmail, but also says offline. This iMac is attatched to comcast, so if I understand, my out going server is always comcast not msn. I wonder if this is Apple v MS and you may have found an area where they are not argueing.

None the less it seems to be working at least for a few hours.

[weintrw]

It's Baaack!

MSN is asking for password again. Frustrating. and annoying. I wonder how much work it would be to close my MSN account. I've been using it for many years.

[iStudentUK]

Originally Posted by weintrw

It's Baaack!

MSN is asking for password again. Frustrating. and annoying. I wonder how much work it would be to close my MSN account. I've been using it for many years.

This happened to me a few months ago. It would ask for a password every few minutes over several days, then stop for a few days and then come back.

I had already thought about closing the account, and this finally pushed me. I set up a new gmail account, and you can set it to fetch messages from you hotmail account. It works well, but hotmail messages can take a few minutes to a few hours to come through. Plus, remember to log into hotmail every 6 months to keep it active.

So when I first set up the gmail account I changed all the common log-ins for websites I used (that was what I used the account for as I have a separate account for personal messages) which took care of 50% of the messages received. Then whenever an email was sent to hotmail arrived in my gmail inbox went and changed the address. After 3 months I rarely get hotmail emails anymore and I should be able to cancel all together soon.

Gmail also gives mw push and IMAP on both my Mac and iPhone which is a big plus and the other main reason I had to change.

[weintrw]

I printed your note out to use as a manual to can MSN. But, I am really entwined with them. Even though I don't use their server directly, 80% of my email snakes passed them. Nearly 100% of my commercial transactions have MSN as the email and it's part of the password system on most sign-ins.

There seem to be a fair number of us with this problem, why doesn't Apple or MS at least look into it?

[colourfastt]

Originally Posted by weintrw

I printed your note out to use as a manual to can MSN. But, I am really entwined with them. Even though I don't use their server directly, 80% of my email snakes passed them. Nearly 100% of my commercial transactions have MSN as the email and it's part of the password system on most sign-ins.

There seem to be a fair number of us with this problem, why doesn't Apple or MS at least look into it?

Perhaps because they're direct competitors.

As far as the rejected password problem is concerned, I like most others had the same problem. I mostly solved it by changing the polling interval to 45 minutes.

[Apple-Guy]

Well it's still working great for me as to date, seldom i get a password enter thingy, but instead of typing it, i just quit and relaunch mail

If you guys want i can make a screeny of the settings

Greetz Apple-Guy

[Relentlos]

Haven't come back to this thread for a while. As stated above, I still have mine set to check only once every hour on it's own, and I occasionally check manually.

The problem with rejection is Microsoft's servers themselves. It may be a safety measure, but with Mail only checking every hour, I hardly have it rejecting my main e-mail which is used often enough. It is a hotmail.com address.

My dummy account used for signing up to things that I think may spam me is a live.ca account, and it appears to reject the password quite often. I normally log back in, or click cancel and later bring it back online. The password itself is not the issue, it's pretty short. Must be that server.

So if your mail app is set to check every 15-20 mins, change it to an hour. There should be less rejections.

[pizzedoff]

This happens to me occasionally, but it's been happening in a constant loop since just after noon PST today, and it's driving me frigging berserk! Is anyone else having this problem? I've had the hotmail account for about 14 years now - aaaaaggggghhhhh!