Adium - 'A Connection Error Occurred'

[Kardashian]

Every 2-3 mins, Adium tells me a 'Connection Error has occurred' - so I have to log out and back in.

I switched from MSN Messenger as Adium is meant to be brilliant. It disconnects more than MSN.

Stupid thing.

Help someone, please...

(Its the latest official release, non-beta)

 

[mkrishnan]

I switched from MSN Messenger as Adium is meant to be brilliant. It disconnects more than MSN.

Okay, I can see that you're angry, and that's understandable... And I don't particularly care if you use Adium or not, although I do think it's brilliant. But... let's start with this.

How often is MSN disconnecting for you? It can stay on for me all day without disconnecting on most days. If you are getting substantial disconnects from MSN (more than ... say one or two a *week*) then you have a network issue, not a messenger client issue. And without fixing it, you're going to get disconnects no matter what software you use....

 

[Kardashian]

MSN used to disconnect every 10-15mins via Messenger for Mac.

iChat stays logged in all the time, as does Yahoo.

Only MSN disconnects. The Windows machines we've used via my router are fine.

 

[mkrishnan]

MSN used to disconnect every 10-15mins via Messenger for Mac.

Then there is something wrong with your network configuration for the Mac (unless everyone in your country has awful MSN service, which I suppose is possible but unlikely). MSN makes different sorts of connections than AIM or Yahoo, so it's quite possible to have a network issue that affects one and not the other two.

What is the specific network setup? What's the source device (modem or whatever), what kind of router is it, are all the computers connected in the same way (wireless/wired, same security protocol, etc)? If you go to System Prefs -> Network -> Assist Me (at bottom) -> Diagnostics, do you get all green bubbles?

 

[Kardashian]

Yeah, all buttons are green.

Its a BT Voyager 205 router I was provided with, after my Netgear stopped working.

I had the same problems on the Netgear, too.

There's only one computer on the network, my iMac. But I have connected friends Windows laptops to the router, and disconnected the iMac - and MSN works fine with them.

MSN has always disconnected on me for as long as I can remember - I even bought a cheap Windows box a few years ago just for MSN.

If you could me get this working, I would be over the moon. Should I turn NAT off on the router? I'm sure I read something about that affecting MSN somewhere.. I could be wrong, I know nothing about networks etc.

Sorry.

 

[mkrishnan]

If you could me get this working, I would be over the moon. Should I turn NAT off on the router? I'm sure I read something about that affecting MSN somewhere.. I could be wrong, I know nothing about networks etc.

Hmmm... so you have a single wired computer connected to the router, and right now you are using NAT. And if the computer is a Windows computer, and it's plugged in, it works fine on the same router with the same settings, but not if it is a Mac.

What I would suggest is start from the really basics... Your router should have a "DMZ" mode where it basically gives access to every port (and the IP address) associated with your connection on the outside world, to one computer. If you do this (I don't know exactly how with this router, unfortunately), and you turn off OS X's firewall, it should be very nearly as if you have no router. If you still get frequent drops in this configuration, then the suspect is something in OS X's network settings.

The other thing you might try is to go in Adium, Preferences, Edit the MSN account, go to the options tab, and then check the "connect via HTTP" box, and see if that helps. It isn't ideal, but... it might be a temporary workaround.

 

[Kardashian]

No idea how to do the DMZ thing you mentioned.

Should I try disabling NAT?

I checked the 'connect via HTTP' option - what does that do?

You've been brilliant help. Thank you.

 

[mkrishnan]

If you know how to disable NAT, sure, I guess so. Unless you play online games or something that requires it?

As for that HTTP option, what it does is this: MSN is built to use specific protocols to talk to its servers. Those protocols are a really good fit to MSN's needs. But they are somewhat more demanding of the way the internet connection is set up than HTTP is. HTTP is the protocol that web browsers use to get web pages. So it works on almost any computer on the internet. So it's sort of a backup option.

See if one/either of those things help. If they do, and you see no downside, just leave well enough alone. Otherwise, it's still quite possible there's something fishy with your network setup.

One more thing to put on your list to try after those two things you're going to try (HTTP and turning NAT off), if those don't work: Go to System Preferences -> Network -> select your interface -> TCP/IP -> Configure IPV6. From there, in the pull down, select IPV6 OFF, and see if this helps. IPV6 is still very rarely used, and you don't need it, and occasionally things get screwed up because of it. Those Windows computers are 95% likely to be configured to have IPV6 off already, and that's another source of possible differences. I don't know specifically why IPV6 should cause you trouble (mine is on), but it seems to occasionally happen.

 

[Kardashian]

Brilliant.

I turned on the HTTP option, and I have yet to receive an error

As for NAT, it wouldn't let me disable it, or use DNZ - the router is flashed with BT firmware, so maybe its limited to what I can change.

I'm on the hunt for a cheap wireless, anyway.

Hoepfully this works now, thanks ever so much.

 

[mkrishnan]

If HTTP works, just run with it.

 

[Kardashian]

Why the shocked face? LOL *concerned*

Is HTTP slower in delivering messages? Sorry, I really don't understand

 

[mkrishnan]

Why the shocked face? LOL *concerned*

Is HTTP slower in delivering messages? Sorry, I really don't understand

No, no. I think there may possibly be some things that don't work as well in HTTP. I'm not sure if you can do Webcam that way (but then you cannot do webcam in Adium to begin with). But what I meant was more that...I do not specifically understand why this works and it didn't work before. But sometimes...erm...Americans say "knock on wood" and also "don't look a gift horse in the mouth." Just accept it and enjoy it, and don't ask why unless it stops working!