SMTP not working on mail and not possible to delete mail account only from one mac

[borgusio]

hello guys,

I am not able to use mail anymore. Basically I do receive emails but I cannot send them out. If I check the smtp connection, everything looks fine. The test works so it should work. Except... it doesn't. It started with one account out of two not working. now both do not work.

Out of desperation I decided to remove the deceived from mail and reactivate them. But when I go into Sys Prefs > Internet Accounts and hit the minus sign, the verification message says that it will be removed from all computers using iCloud Keychain and lists my other Mac.

I do not want to remove the accounts from my other Mac, because is my desktop, where I also do my backups from.

Any ideas how to proceed?

Apparently I am not alone, this guy has the same problem:
https://apple.stackexchange.com/que...-a-mail-account-on-only-one-icloud-synced-mac

 

[BrianBaughn]

When you navigate to Mail>Preferences, click "Accounts", select an active account on the left, click "Server Settings", click the Outgoing Mail Account popup and select "Edit SMTP Server List…" do you see any servers in the list?

 

[borgusio]

two servers, one for each account. However, it is set to the first item on the list which is "none".

If I manually change to the right server, it forgets username and password in one case (gmx) and it still does not work in the other case (yahoo)

 

[BrianBaughn]

Just to clarify...this is the SMTP server list that shows when selecting "Edit SMTP Server List…":

In my case, there's nothing in the list. You're saying that two SMTP servers are in that list?

 

[borgusio]

Correct. I manually added two servers. The third one (Yahoo!) is not in the list but it shows up anyways. But If I try to send an email the following happens (sorry it is in Italian):

-> Sender mailbox unavailable

-> Authentication required

And if I go in connection status, it shows a successful connection (green):

[doublepost=1533627890][/doublepost]Besides, from my iPhone both accounts work.
From my Mac mini only one works (yahoo).
[doublepost=1533628808][/doublepost]also, if I try to send with GMX, it asks me to set a favorite SMTP server. If I add username and password, it won't remember them.

 

[borgusio]

So now I deleted the additional SMTP servers (so I am in the same situation you describe). If I try to send an email, it asks to select an SMTP server. If I select the right one it says "authentication required". I add all the data, I save them and then it returns back to "none" in the settings. so basically there is no way to save the settings and it will start over and over again with the same cycle of issues
[doublepost=1533633768][/doublepost]for me Mail is become a totally unusable piece of crap. That is why I would like to delete the accounts from my Mac and set them fresh in outlook (or maybe even mail), but if I try to remove them from my Mac, iCloud tells me that it will remove them automatically from my other devices, as well, which completely nuts!

 

[BrianBaughn]

You aren't forced to use iCloud Keychain syncing. I don't. Who wants troubleshooting steps to propagate to other devices?

The thing about added SMTP servers is that they seem to stick to Mail even after you delete the Mail account for which you added them...possibly causing issues to recur.

Have you tried...in this order...turn off iCloud Keychain, delete the additional SMTP servers, delete the Internet Accounts for which you have mail, delete the contents of ~/Library/Mail, and then re-add the Internet Accounts for the email accounts?

 

[borgusio]

thanks Brian, at least now I could remove the account from mail. One step forward. I will keep you posted
[doublepost=1533654100][/doublepost]yahoo! seems to be solved, thanks again. Going for GMX now and then if it works one last question:

Do I reactivate keychain now? Basically my main Mac is at home and this macbook I am writing on should be totally cloud based and I'd prefer to have keychain active to keep password in sync..
[doublepost=1533654481][/doublepost]GMX is working as well. Perfect! I had no idea I had to switch off iCloud-Keychain. Back to my last question:
can / should I reactivate it now?