Valley TechNologies - your premier website developer!

System Messages

UPDATE ON SERVER MIGRATION - 2/2/2012 - 10:10am

We have noted that some sites may have not yet completely "resolved" through the "world wide web" to point to the new server instead of the previous one. This is something that can take a few more hours to work itself out, but in the meantime we are doing what we can to make sure that all requests that come into the old server are "forced" to the new one.

Thank you for your patience while these last issues are resolved.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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UPDATE ON SERVER MIGRATION - 2/2/2012 - 7:30am

The overnight migration to our new server went as expected, with very few instances of items that need to yet be re-established. Specifically:

SSL Certificates (clients may get a "security warning")
Databases have yet to complete testing
Spam filtering on e-mails is still being configured, so you may see a rise in spam until that is completed
Files that were damaged need to be re-built from the server outage on 1/30/2012 are still in progress

As you can imagine, there are likely to be some instances of things that are not exactly like they were before the migration. We expect any issues to be both minor and easily corrected.

If you have a specific request for instances that need to be addressed, please submit a Help Desk Ticket here for quickest resolution.

Thank you for your patience during this server migration.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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UPDATE ON SERVER OUTAGE - 2/1/2012 - 1:45pm

E-mail service and websites have stabilized, and we expect at worst-case scenario that they will be intermittent throughout the day today.

Please note that at midnight tonight, all services will be taken down for approximately 2-3 hours, until 2-3am on Thursday, Feb. 2 - web sites, e-mail, databases, help desk ticketing, etc. - while we migrate all of the files to the new server. In doing so, you should see no change in the way you access any of your services.

There was an initial plan to possibly do the migration at 6pm today, but the systems appear to have stabilized to the point that we are confident that we can hold off to a time when there will be less impact on the use of the systems.

If you need service on any other issue, please submit a Help Desk Ticket here for quickest resolution,

We will update this message with additional information as it becomes available.

Our apologies, and we thank you in advance for your patience while we correct the remaining issues.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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CRITICAL OUTAGE ON 1/30/2012 - 8:15am

Our main website and e-mail server had an incident sometime around 5:30AM on Monday, 1/30/2012, that caused an interruption of e-mail services. Such an interruption does happen on rare occasion, and can normally be corrected by simply re-starting the specific features on the server. In this case it did not.|

Our server team suggested restarting the server. This is something that is not done in an uplanned mode except in critical conditions, and when in non-critical mode we would do so only at the least impact hours, normally 2-4am on Sunday mornings.

In this case, the re-boot (and 2nd re-boot) of the server indicated a corrupt file on the server that prevented it from booting to full and normal operating conditions. The hard drive did not "fail" but some of the information on that drive prevented it from functioning as it should, indicating that the situation was more likely an issue with the operating system on the server.

The team decided to replace the hard drive, and then restore all data back to the new hard drive from backups. This procedure is tested every couple of months for integrity. Unfortunately, the corrupted data on the server also affected the ability to do a complete restore from the backup. It also affected the data stored on the server's "mirrored" drive, as that drive also contained the corrupted file.

Update 1/31/12 3:20am

It turns out that the corrupt data on the server also corrupted the backup process. We were able to restore much of the data, and most websites are back and functional - if they are not as of this writing, they should be shortly.

However, most of the e-mail boxes will have to be re-created, as well as many of the databases that were used on the sites. Sites that contained SSL certificates will also have to have them "re-keyed".

Our first priority is to re-establish the e-mail accounts. Our entire Valley Technologies team is working to restore these accounts. If your e-mail account is not working properly, please submit a helpdesk ticket here, and supply the full address of the account, as well as the initial password that you would like on the account.

Then make sure that your local e-mail software is set to the same password.

We will update this message with additional information as it becomes available.

Our apologies. And we thank you for your patience while we correct the remaining issues.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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11/21/2011 - 3:30pm

We have received one report of a client having some issues with SMTP service. As of this writing, it does not appear to be an issue on our server, however, we are investigating it. But due to the issuse experienced on 11/14, we wanted to post this and ask that if anyone else is experiencing the issue to please submit a Help Desk Ticket here.

Thank you.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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11/14/2011 - 11:30am

We received a message that email processing began slowing at approximately 2pm CT on 11/14/2011. A look at the system indicates that incoming e-mails (POP3) are processing as they should, but the outgoing (SMTP) were processing slow.

If you receive reports of emails that you send are not being received by the recipient, or if the matter is urgent, we recommend temporarily using another email SMTP service or phone the recipient to discuss the matter in person.

This message will be updated as we have additional information available.

** UPDATE 11/15/2011 - 6:50am: SMTP mail queue still process e-mails slowly; re-booted system at 6:55 am to attempt to clear it.

** UPDATE 11/15/2011 - 9:10am: The reboot of the server did not resolve issues with the outgoing SMTP service. The incoming still appear to work as usual, but the outgoing are "spotty' at best. There is apparently an e-mail in the outgoing queue that is a corrupted file that is blocking other e-mails from processing properly. We are working to correct the issue, and appreciate your patience while we attempt to clear it.

** UPDATE 11/15/2011 - 7:30pm: The e-mail outgoing SMTP service was sporadic throughout most of the day. We were able to identify the corrupt file, but nature of the file prevented it from being deleted until all of the "good" files were sent from the queue. That happened at approximately 7:30pm, and we were able to then delete the corrupted file, and all has been working as it should since then.

Your patience is appreciated.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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10/23/2011 - 11:30am

Some websites began having problems displaying beginning Saturday evening, 10/22. By early morning today, all websites were down. All e-mails were working properly during the web site outages.

To correct all issues, the server was re-booted at 11:15am, and all was back working as it should by 11:30am. We are investigating to find and correct the cause. We apologize for any inconvenience.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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10/15/2011 - 7:20am

Yesterday's server outage required us to completely re-configure our SSL settings - so you are likely still getting a notice regarding an invalid certificate when sending or receiving e-mails. The certificate IS VALID, so you just need to authorize the use of the certificate.

We are working on getting that resolved now, and will update this message board with the results.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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10/14/2011 - 2:30pm update

It appears that all issues regarding the SSL and server hardware failure have now been cleared, and all should be working as expected.

It is important to note that we will NEVER, EVER REBOOT THE SERVER BETWEEN 6AM AND 11PM - or all during the week - unless we find it ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY to do so.

On the contrary, it is our responsiblilty to you - our valued clients - to keep the server running by all possible means and at the highest level of efficiency 24 hours a day, 365 days per year. There are times however, and luckily quite rare, when a particular situation does require that service is interrupted.

Rest assured that the crew members managing our server are very competent, and work diligently to minimize any interruption in service.

If you continue to experience any issues, please use the above links to submit a ticket to our Help Desk Staff - this is the quickest way to resolve any issues you may be having.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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10/14/2011 - 1:45pm update

In order to resolve the earlier SSL message, it was determined that a server re-boot was necessary, which was done at approximately 10:45am CT, and should have only disabled systems for a matter of a few minutes. However, there was a hardware failure indicated on the re-boot which we believe was the reason that the SSL message never cleared.

That hardware failure is being addressed as quickly as possible.

Service now seems to have restored completely as of about 1:40pm, except the SSL connection still is showing an error, and we are working to resolve that issue.

We apologize for the inconvenience, and appreciate your patience while we worked diligently to correct the issue.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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10/14/2011 7:50am

Valley TechNologies access is showing an "Invalid Certificate" error message when attempting to login to our systems, or when accessing e-mail accounts. We have corrected the issue, and it will correct itself by the end of the day - it could take up to 24 hours to propagate throughout the World-Wide Web.

In the meantime, allow access to remove the message.

Thank you for your patience.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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UPDATE 9/16/2011 2:35pm

We have found the earlier issue and corrected it.

ISSUE SUMMARY: Our server-based anti-spam software - SpamAssassin - was caught in an error loop that caused it to continually re-process e-mails, slowing down the system, running up server CPU usasge, and delaying both incoming and outgoing e-mail processing. As soon as we stopped and restarted the SpamAssassin process, all e-mails were delivered immediately from the message queue.

Even though the issus has been resolved, we are going to re-boot the server. But because all is working as it should right now and we will continue to monitor it throughout the day, we are going to delay the re-boot until 10:00pm Central Time in order to not interfere with normal processing during regular business hours.

Your patience is greatly appreciated.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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UPDATE 9/16/2011 12:05pm

We have noticed that there is an error loop within the memory of our primary web server that is causing a slow down in e-mail processing, FTP access, and some of the activities on that server. This will require a re-boot of the server to clear it.

Although it is an inconvenience, our staff has discussed the situation, and we will continue to push the e-mail processing throughout the day, and then re-boot the server at 5pm Central time. Until the re-boot is complete, you may also notice an increase in spam messages as the spam filter on the server may stop and retart intemittantly.

The server and all e-mail processing will be inaccessible during the re-boot. The entire process could take 30-90 minutes.

Please pass this message on to others in your organization. We apologize for the inconvenience and appreciate your patience while we resolve the issue.

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9/16/2011 9:50am

Valley TechNologies incoming and outgoing e-mail services are experiencing delays of up to 60 minutess on e-mails, where normal processing takes place within just a few seconds. Because of the slow processing, e-mails are backing up in the mail queue. We are monitoring the systems to push e-mail processing ahead of other services to speed up delivery, while at the same time trouble-shooting the issue that is causing the slow down..

We will update this message as we progress through the resolution. Our apologies for any inconveniece.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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6/21/2011 9:50am

Valley TechNologies incoming e-mail services is experiencing delays of up to several hours on e-mails. Outgoing e-mails are not affected.

Update 6/21/2011 10:25am - we are re-booting the server to resolve the issue with the incoming e-mail, and all serivces (including websites and e-mails) will be down for a short period.

Update 6/21/2011 12:14pm - the problem appears to have been related to a single e-mail account on the server, that was generating an "error loop" that kept sending error messages to that account filling up the mail queue with over 10,000 messages (normally there are no more than 10 messages in the queue at any given time).

We believe that the issue is now resolved, and all e-mails should be delivered within the next hour.

Our apologies for the inconvenience, and our thank you for your patience as we worked to resolve the issue.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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5/27/2011 9:40am - Valley TechNologies Bandwidth exceeded

At approximately 5:30am this morning, the Valley TechNolgoies server had reached a limit on its monthly bandwidth usage that affected access to some e-mails. No e-mails were lost by any of our clients during this service interruption.

The only exception were for a few that were sent directly to an address @valley-technologies.com. Those that sent an e-mail to that address should have received a "rejection" e-mail with an error message explaining the rejection.

All domains - including our own - have a bandwidth limit imposed, although somewhat arbitrarily, in order to make sure that no single domain is "hogging" bandwidth (and therefore slowing down access by others) as well protect our server from outside attacks from those that launch spam and malware to the outside world from unsuspecting domains.

The good news is that business activity has been on the rise, and our own server has been seeing a related increase in activity. We have also seen a welcome increase in activity by our clients, which hopefully relates to an increase in their business as well. The down side is that we received the unforseen jump in bandwidth usage.

That condition has now been corrected, so that from now on, not only on our domain but on all domains, any imposed limits may be exceeded without service interruption, and a message will automatically go to our Support Team to investigate and manually take any action necessary to correct the condition.

Our apologies for any inconvenience, and our thank you for your patience as we worked to resolve the issue.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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3/30/2011 12:05pm

At approximately 10:15am, one of our main servers that hosts a majority of our website and e-mail accounts reported a hardware issue that could not be resolved by re-boot. At 10:50am the technician on-site reported that he is working on the issue.

The server issue was found and the server came back on-line as of approximately 11:55am, however, the issue was found in a string of connections to our server, and as each of those connections in the string are tested over the next 24 hours, there may be some intermittent and temporary interruption of service.

Our apologies for the inconvenience, and our thank you for your patience as we worked to resolve the issue.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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3/10/2011 12:30am

We are updating several systems including the DNS, Web, E-Mai and FTP servers. You may experience slow response times or timeout errors for the next hour or so. The main reason for the upgrades is to apply a security patch to prevent a denial of service attack on our DNS. While the DNS is being serviced, we will also be applying several minor upgrades to the previously mentioned servers. We are doing our best to minimize down time of all services.

Our apologies for the interruption of service, and we appreciate your patience.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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Update 11/22/2010 12:51am

A minor security update had previously been causing login errors when using the FTP services. This issue has been resolved without any reduction in security.

Our apologies for the interruption of service, and we appreciate your patience.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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11/21/2010 10:25pm

A few clients who use FTP may be experiencing "Login Incorrect" errors when attempting to login. We are addressing this issue and will have it resolved shortly.

Our apologies for the interruption of service, and we appreciate your patience.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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Update 10/22/2010 9:25am

Our servers experienced a connectivity earlier this morning. As a result, websites and e-mails were completely inaccessible for a period of approximately one hour. As sites are now back and fully functional, e-mails may be delayed, over the next 60-90 minutes as systems are brought back to full functionality and processes are re-synced.

If you continue to have e-mail issues after 10:00am CDT, please submit a system Help Desk Ticket using the link on the above navigation bar.

Our apologies for the interruption of service, and we appreciate your patience.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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10/22/2010 8:35am

At approximately 8:20 this morning, our servers re-booted, and are extremely slow in bringing the systems back to normal state. The disruption is also affecting e-mail service.

It appears as though systems are coming back, but very slowly. We appreciate your patience while the issue is being resolved, and rest assured that our support team is working vigorously to resolve the issues.

This message board will be updated after we have reviewed the issue.

Our apologies for the interruption of service, and we appreciate your patience.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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9/14/2010 1:30pm

Approximately 1:10pm today, our server began sending messages that some of the services (such as e-mail) were unavailable, and reports were coming from clients getting "fatal errors" while accessing some on-line features such as e-mail or Content Management Systems (CMS).

Our technicians determined that a reboot of the server was required. That took place at approximately 1:30pm, and all services should return to normal within 1/2 hour.

Our apologies for the interruption of service, and we appreciate your patience.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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9/9/2010 3:45pm

Our VTECH5 web/mail server is currently experiencing an unusual amount of e-mail being processed (especially e-mails being sent to a large number of recipients), and is processing outgoing e-mails very slowly (some even having been "hung up" in the server for over an hour).

We are monitoring the flow of e-mails. While this slow-down is occurring, we encourage you to send each message to only five recipients at a time, which will help to ease the congestion on the server.

We appreciate your patience.

Your Suppot Team at
Valley TechNologies

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UPDATE: 6/10/2010 11:00am

Note that the re-boot of the VTECH5 server occurred at 10:50 am, and has succeeded in resetting our out-going mail queue. The actual outage was for about 10minutes, but it can take up to an additional 20 minutes to restore connections for all of the websites, e-mails, active databases, etc.

All should now be back to a normal state. If you have any further issues with e-mails (or any of our other services), please make use of our on-line ticketing system here to report and track any problems.

Normally, a re-boot of the server will typically take place on a weekend night during very early moring hours in order to have the least amount of impact on your business. The only time we reboot a server during "active business hours" is when attempts to restore a critical service fails, and our only option is to re-boot the server during those busier hours.

We apologize for any inconvenience caused by this short outage.

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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6/10/2010 10:10am

Our VTECH5 web/mail server is currently processing outgoing e-mails very slowly (some even having been "hung up" in the server for over an hour), and requires that we re-boot the server to re-establish some connections.

Web service and e-mail incoming/outgoing should be down for no more than 5 minutes beginning at approximately 10:30am today, 6/10/2010.

Thank you for your patience!

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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3/11/2010 3:50pm

Valley TechNologies has received reports that e-mails have not been received by some of our clients, or have been unusually delayed in being received.

The issue seems to be very isolated and sporadic, and comes only from websites on our servers that have the "DNS Pointers" settings to a particular destination. The settings are valid, and have been in place for almost six years. Some of those DNS settings were updated in September of 2008.

We have found that updating some additional settings - even though we do not change any of the destination DNS pointers - seems to "re-align" and correct the DNS issues, almaost as if the setting had been "dormant", and needed something to "kick it" so the World Wide Web would recognize it as a valid setting. Once reconciled, the e-mails are received without issue.

We are in the process of going through each of the domains on our servers that have not had the settings updated prior to September of 2008, to take a pro-active role in correcting the issue, as well as avoiding any other issues that may be the result of these "dormant" settings.

For those domains in which we do not control the DNS settings, we will be contacting the Domain Manager with instructions for changing the affected settings.

Again, the reports are very isolated and sporadic, so you may never have been affected by the settings. The issue is in the process of being corrected, and should resolve itself within 24 hours. If you continue to have an issue with it, please submit a help desk ticket here, so we can document the problem and resolution on our system.

Thank you!

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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03/04/10 8:36pm

Due to a recently found bug in our spam filtering software, we will be doing UNSCHEDULED MAINTENANCE on our mail servers with the necessary updates starting at 10:00 tonight. The bug caused some e-mails sent in 2010 to have a higher score (+3.2 points) based on the 2010 sending date.

You may experience intermittent "Server not found" or "Server timeout" errors between 10:00pm and midnight when sending or receiving e-mail. If you receive any errors while sending or receiving e-mail, please wait a few minutes and try again.

While we are upgrading our mail servers, we will also do some minor updates to the web servers as well. While the websites will not be effected, access to your Domain Administrator account may be unavailable. If you experience troubles logging into your Plesk account, please wait 30 minutes and try again.

Should you experience any troubles after midnight, please submit a help desk ticket here, so we can document the resolution on our system.

Thank you!

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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10/14/09 11:15am

If you are receiving a message regarding a Security alert when logging into your e-mail account or your account manager, it is okay to go ahead and by-pass that warning.

One of the Security Certificates for one of our servers simply needed to be "re-keyed" with some updated information.

This is one of the beauties of an SSL certificate, in that if absolutely everything does not coincide as it should throughout the entire process, the site gets "flagged" until the issue is resolved.

The issue has been corrected, and should resolve itself before the end of the day today. If you continue to have an issue with it, please submit a help desk ticket here, so we can document the resolution on our system.

Thank you!

Your Support Team at
Valley TechNologies

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10/2/09 1:45pm

A corrupt e-mail file locked up e-mail processing, requiring a re-boot of the server; e-mail processing was interrupted for about 15 minutes, and complete system outage lasted approximately 5 minutes during the server re-boot.

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9/25/09 - 8:00am

The upgrade to the e-mail spam filters allows more flexibilty to the individual user for filtering unwanted e-mail.

If you are experiencing issues with an increase in spam, try making adjustments as outlined in this instruction: click here.

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9/22/09 - 4:00am to 5:30am

We are performing minor upgrades to the spamfilters in use for all mail servers.
You will experience slow response times, login errors, and server not found errors during this time.
If any problems persist after 5:30am, please submit a help desk ticket.

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7/13/09 11:20am-CDT

Reports are widespread across the WWW of intermittent slowdowns in accessing some websites and in e-mail processing, likely due to additional measures being taken by host companies around the world to make sure that last week's cyber attacks against some US and S. Korean websites (suspected originating from N. Korea) are not invading their servers as well.

Hopefully, this slowdown is temporary.

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6/26/09 10:55am-CDT

The issue earlier this morning in regards to our e-mail server has cleared. This is a new server on our system, and should be processing the e-mails much faster than it is.

To get a better handle on the issue, our team will be performing some tests on this server after 5pm CDT. These tests are expected to last up to two hours. During this time, outgoing e-mail service may be sporadic. This will only pertain to those customers where the outgoing SMTP server is set to mail.valley-technologies.com, or mail.<yourdomain> (where the <yourdomain> is replaced by your actual domain name). There will be no effect on incoming e-mails.

Please contact our office if you have any questions.

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6/26/09 10:00am-CDT

Our e-mail server needed to be re-started about 9:45am, which may cause an error regarding "invalid rcpthosts". This is a temporary condition that should be resolved shortly.

Our apologies for the inconvenience.

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6/15/09 UPDATE 11:30AM-CDT

FLOODS OF E-MAILS FROM LAST WEEKEND'S SLOWDOWN REQUIRED A RESTART OF THE E-MAIL SERVER THIS MORNING. ALL SHOULD NOW BE WORKING PROPERLY.

ANY MESSAGES THAT YOU RECEIVED INDICATING THAT A PARTICULAR DOMAIN IS NOT IN THE LIST OF ALLOWED RCPTHOSTS WILL NEED TO BE RESENT.

OUR APOLOGIES.

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6/11/09 UPDATE 4:00M-CDT

IT TURNS OUT THAT WE ARE NOT ALONE IN SLUGGISH E-MAIL SERVICE. SEVERAL COMPANIES ARE REPORTING INTERNET DELAYS ALL OVER THE COUNTRY, NOT CONFIRMED BUT SUSPECTED TO BE LINKED TO TORRENTIAL DOWNPOURS AND FLOODING IN THE SOUTH, INCLUDING THE DALLAS / FT. WORTH AREAS, WHERE SEVERAL AREAS ARE WITHOUT POWER AS OF THIS WRITING.

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6/11/09 UPDATE 10:00AM-CDT

OVER THE LAST SEVERAL HOURS THERE HAVE BEEN REPORTS OF A WEB OUTAGE IN THE DALLAS AREA THAT IS AFFECTING THE ABILITY OF WEB USERS ALL OVER THE COUNTRY TO ACCESS WEB PAGES. IT IS ALSO AFFECTING THE ABILITY TO SEND OR RECEIVE SOME E-MAILS.

HERE IS A FREE TOOL THAT CAN ASSIST IN FINDING WHERE THE OUTAGE IS OCCURRING: http://network-tools.com/. TYPE IN AN IP ADDRESS OR A WEBSITE THAT YOU ARE HAVING AN ISSUE WITH (LIKE "hotmail.com" OR "mail.valley-technologies.com"), CLICK "GO", AND IT WILL IDENTIFY BY "TIMEOUT" WHERE THE CONNECTION IS FAILING.

NOTE THAT THIS IS NOT AN ISSUE WITH VALLEY TECHNOLOGIES SERVERS, BUT A FAILURE IN THE CONNECTIONS ALONG THE WEB ROUTING OF THE INFORMATION.

MORE INFORMATION WILL BE POSTED HERE AS IT BECOMES AVAILABLE.

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6/1/09 UPDATE 10:20AM-CDT

LAST NIGHT (5/31) ATFER EXTENSIVE TESTING, WE COMPLETED THE SETTINGS CHANGES FOR THE SYSTEM SPAM FILTER, SO YOU SHOULD SEE A DRASTIC REDUCTION IN THE AMOUNT OF INCOMING JUNK MAIL TODAY. AS THE SPAM FILTERS CONTINUE THEIR "TRAINING", SPAM WILL BE REDUCED EVEN MORE.

AS PART OF THAT PROCESS, YOUR OUTGOING E-MAILS MAY OR MAY NOT BE AFFECTED. IT APPEARS TO BE AFFECTING ONLY MICROSOFT OUTLOOK, AND THE ISSUES SEEM TO DEPEND ON THE EXACT VERSION OF MICROSOFT OUTLOOK 2003 OR 2007 THAT YOU ARE USING. E-MAILS USING MICROSOFT OUTLOOK EXPRESS OR WINDOWS MAIL (IN VISTA OPERATING SYSTEMS) AND OTHER E-MAIL PRODUCTS DO NOT APPEAR TO BE AFFECTED.

IF YOU ARE RECEIVING A SYSTEM MESSAGE CONTAINING INFORMATION REGARDING AN "ERROR 551" OR "ERROR 553" YOU MAY NEED TO ADJUST YOUR SETTINGS AND TEST THEM TO MAKE SURE WHICH RESOLUTION FITS YOUR APPLICATION.

IF YOU ARE NOT COMFORTABLE ADJUSTING THESE SETTINGS, CALL OUR OFFICE AT 262.673.1979 AND WE WILL STEP YOU THROUGH THE SETTINGS.

IF YOU ARE COMFORTABLE WITH MAKING THESE CHANGES ON YOUR OWN, GET INTO YOUR E-MAIL ACCOUNT SETTINGS AND:

FIRST, MAKE SURE THAT THE BOX IS CHECKED INDICATING THAT "MY OUTGOING SERVER (SMTP) REQUIRES AUTHENTICATION".

NEXT, MAKE CHANGES EITHER AS OUTLINED IN STEP 2.A. OR 2.B BELOW.
A. CLICK TO "LOG ON TO INCOMING MAIL SERVER BEFORE SENDING MAIL".
- SEND A TEST E-MAIL TO AN ACCOUNT THAT IS SURE TO GO TO AN EXTERNAL SERVER (LIKE HOTMAIL, AOL, GMAIL, YAHOO, ETC.), OR "RESEND" ONE OF THE MESSAGES THAT GENERATED THE ERROR.
AFTER A FEW MINUTES, CLICK ON THE "SEND/RECEIVE" BUTTON. IF YOU DO NOT RECEIVE A SYSTEM ERROR MESSAGE, THE REQUIRED CHANGES ARE COMPLETE. IF YOU HAVE RECEIVED ANOTHER ERROR MESSAGE, CONTINUE BELOW.

B. CLICK TO "USE SAME SETTINGS AS MY INCOMING MAIL SERVER".

SEND A TEST E-MAIL TO AN ACCOUNT THAT IS SURE TO GO TO AN EXTERNAL SERVER (LIKE HOTMAIL, AOL, GMAIL, YAHOO, ETC.), OR "RESEND" ONE OF THE MESSAGES THAT GENERATED THE ERROR.
AFTER A FEW MINUTES, CLICK ON THE "SEND/RECEIVE" BUTTON. IF YOU DO NOT RECEIVE A SYSTEM ERROR MESSAGE, THE REQUIRED CHANGES ARE COMPLETE. IF YOU HAVE RECEIVED ANOTHER ERROR MESSAGE, CONTINUE BELOW.

IF THE CHANGES IN STEP 2 DID NOT RESOLVE THE ISSUE, CONTACT OUR OFFICE FOR ADDITIONAL ASSISTANCE.

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5/28/09 UPDATE 11:30AM-CDT

As of 2:00pm yesterday all e-mail issues were resolved by moving all e-mail accounts to a new mail server. We are working on completing the setup of this new server today. All changes will be minor, but may cause "temporary errors" when sending or receiving mail. If you receive an error message with the word "temporary" please try again in two minutes. These messages are a result of the final setup process and are in place to ensure the server does not process mail while a new setting is being put into place.
SPAM
We are aware of an increase in spam e-mail and are working on "training" the new server's spam settings. Spam should slowly decrease throughout the day and should no longer be an issue by Friday.

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5/27/09 UPDATE 1:30PM-CDT

ALL E-MAIL SERVICES WILL BE HALTED FOR ABOUT 5 MINUTES BEGINNING AT 1:35PM IN AN EFFORT TO "UNCLOG THE JAM" IN THE MAIL QUEUE. WE WILL LIKELY SEE A TEMPORARY SURGE IN SPAM AND JUNK MAIL WHEN THE MAIL SERVICES ARE RESTARTED.

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5/27/09 UPDATE 10:45AM-CDT

THE PROCESS ALSO SEEMS TO BE AFFECTING SOME MESSAGES THAT ARE GOING TO RECIPIENTS OUTSIDE OF OUR SERVER IP LIST. YOU MAY RECEIVE A MESSAGE FROM THE "SYSTEM ADMINISTRATOR" WITH AN ERROR # 553 THAT THE DOMAIN IS NOT IN THE LIST OF ALLOWED RCPTHOSTS. THIS IS BEING ADDRESSED AS WELL, AND ONCE IT IS RESOLVED (AND MESSAGE POSTED HERE THAT IT IS), YOU WILL NEED TO RESEND THOSE MESSAGES.

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5/27/09 UPDATE 10:45AM-CDT

Valley TechNologies experienced a failure with our main mail server this morning,
starting at approximately 1:30am until approximately 9:30am. During this time most
outside mail traffic was deferred to be delivered later. As a result of this deferred
mail, we are experiencing extremely large amounts of mail to be processed. This is
causing all incoming and outgoing messages to move through the system slower than usual.

Please bear with us as we have moved all mail traffic to our backup server to clear this
backlog. We expect things to slowly clear up through the day.

You may also experience an increase in spam - this is only temporary until our main mail
server is back online. The spam filters on the backup system are not as robust as our
main mail server.

We apologize for the inconvenience, and appreciate your patience.

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5/27/09 UPDATE 10:05AM-CDT

OUTGOING E-MAIL APPEARS TO BE RESOLVED, INCOMING IS MOVING SLOWLY DUE TO THE BACKLOG OF INCOMING MESSAGES.

DUE TO THE ISSUES WITH SETTINGS ON THE NEW OUTGOING E-MAIL SERVICE, WE HAVE TEMPORARILY ROLLED BACK THE SMTP PROCESS TO OUR PREVIOUS SERVICE, AND WILL WORK OVERNIGHT TONIGHT TO RE-TEST THE SETTINGS ON THE NEW SERVICE.

THANK YOU FOR YOUR PATIENCE!

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5/27/09 UPDATE 8:05AM-CDT

WE ARE EXPERIENCING SOME ISSUES WITH THE E-MAIL SETTINGS ON THE SERVER (BOTH INCOMING AND OUTGOING), AND THE SERVER TEAM IS INVESTIGATING AND WORKING ON A FIX. THIS MAY INCLUDE RE-BOOTING THE SERVER, IN WHICH CASE THE WEB PAGES MAY BE DOWN FOR A FEW MINUTES AS WELL.

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5/26/09 UPDATE 2:40PM

THE SERVER UPGRADE OVER THE WEEKEND WENT EXCEPTIONALLY WELL. WE ARE HOWEVER EXPERIENCING SOME MINOR DELAYS IN E-MAIL PROCESSING AS WE TWEAK THE SYSTEM FOR OPTIMUM PERFORMANCE.

WE ANTICIPATE THAT THESE DELAYS WILL OCCUR INTERMITTANTLY THROUGHOUT THE DAY TODAY AS WE MAKE THE ADJUSTMENTS.

THANK YOU FOR YOUR PATIENCE!

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5/13/09 UPDATE 7:30AM-CDT

THE SERVER HAS BEEM REBOOTED TO RESOLVE AN INDEXING ISSUE IN THE E-MAIL PROCESSING.. ALL FUNCTIONS SHOULD BE BACK AND OPERATIONAL SHORTLY. THANK YOU FOR YOUR PATIENCE.

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4/30/09 UPDATE 2:45PM-CDT

E-MAIL SMTP (OUTGOING) ISSUE IS UNDER CONTROL, BUT STILL NOT WHERE WE WANT TO BE. WE ARE CONTINUING TO MONITOR THE SITUATION AND ARE WORKING ON BUILDING THE SPEED FOR THE SMTP PROCESSES.

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4/29/09 UPDATE 3:05PM-CDT

E-MAIL SMTP (OUTGOING) SERVICE IS WORKING, HOWEVER INTERMITTANT STOPS ARE HOLDING MESSAGES IN THE OUTGOING E-MAIL QUEUE FOR UP TO 20 MINUTES. WE ARE WORKING TO GET THIS DOWN TO THE NORMAL 10 SECOND QUEUE PROCESSING TIME.

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4/29/09 UPDATE 1:25PM-CDT

E-MAIL SMTP (OUTGOING) SERVICE INTERRUPTIONS ARE BEING MONITORED FOR POTENTIAL ISSUES. E-MAIL FROM VALLEY TECHNOLOGIES SMTP SERVICE, AS WELL AS OUTGOING E-MAILS FROM WEBMAIL MAY BE AFFECTED, BUT CURRENTLY ARE INTERMITTANT AND VERY SHORT-TERM. CHECK BACK HERE FOR UPDATES ON THIS ISSUE.

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4/15/09 UPDATE: 4:42PM-CDT

E-MAIL ISSUES HAVE NOW BEEN RESOLVED, AND THE OUTGOING E-MAIL QUEUE HAS BEEN COMPLETELY PROCESSED.

TO AVOID SIMILAR OCCURANCES IN THE FUTURE, WE HAVE INCREASED OUR SMTP OUTPUT CAPABILITIES BY 10X THE PREVIOUS AMOUNT.

THANK YOU ALL FOR YOUR PATIENCE!

YOUR SUPPORT TEAM AT VALLEY TECHNOLOGIES

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4/15/09 UPDATE:

WHILE WE ARE CORRECTING THE E-MAIL ISSUE BELOW:

1. IF E-MAILS ARE NOT GETTING THROUGH TO THE RECIPIENTS, PLEASE BE PATIENT. THE OUTGOING MAIL QUEUE FILLED UP, AND IS SLOWLY PROCESSING THE E-MAILS THAT ARE BACKED UP IN THAT QUEUE.

2. IF YOU RECEIVE A "BOUNCE" MESSAGE THAT THE RECIPIENT IS INVALID, SEND THE MESSAGE AGAIN (PREFERABLY AFTER WE ARE SURE THAT THE ISSUES HAVE BEEN RESOLVED) ALONG WITH A NOTE THAT WE HAVE BEEN EXPERIENCING SOME ISSUES ON OUR E-MAIL SERVER, AND THAT THEY MAY RECEIVE YOUR MESSAGE TWICE.

THANK YOU FOR YOUR PATIENCE!

YOUR SUPPORT TEAM AT VALLEY TECHNOLOGIES

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4/15/09 NOTICE:

WE HAVE BEEN EXPERIENCING SOME TEMPORARY ISSUES WITH OUT-GOING E-MAILS FROM OUR SERVER. WE ARE WORKING DILIGENTLY ON CORRECTING THE ISSUE. E-MAIL FROM VALLEY TECHNOLOGIES SMTP SERVICE, AS WELL AS OUTGOING E-MAILS FROM WEBMAIL MAY BE AFFECTED. CHECK BACK HERE FOR UPDATES ON THIS ISSUE.

THANK YOU!

YOUR SUPPORT TEAM AT VALLEY TECHNOLOGIES

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