Orange ICON 225 Mobile broadband

[Doug Stormforce]

The orange customer support team for this device has not got a clue how to resolve the problems I am having with my mobile broadband. I get the feeling from their tone of voice that it’s not just me they can’t help. I live on the top floor pretty close to the city centre so SHOULD NOT have a signal strength problem

Anyway some of the problems relate to signal strength. I have been told (by Orange) if you run the diagnostics and have a signal of 15 or more you can run Internet Explorer, if the strength is less than 15 although you are online but you will receive the “Internet Explorer can not display this page….” Screen. In this situation I can still receive emails through outlook ( as long as they are not too big)

I am getting the above message frequently even when the ICON diagnostics give the strength as 19 and more.

Equally frustrating is that this dongle does not appear to work with Outlook, not too many problems receiving mail but I can’t send. I’ve tried changing the SMTP outgoing mail server to loads of different things and tried changing a few other settings.

Does anyone else use the ICON 225 and have any solutions? I have tried both the 3G and GPRS networks/options. I get slightly better but slower results from the GPRS, however Outlook does not send with either.

Also it was suggested to me that I buy a USB extension so that I can put the dongle by the window for better signal. Tried this (5m lead) and it does not work. Is it because my windows may be the opposite side of the building to the mast or is this a myth?

Thanks in advance for any help/advice.

[C2 RIBS]

Doug, try this link to forums for broadband. http://bbs.adslguide.org.uk/
If you look for the Orange/Wannado forms then there are quite a few tech people from Orange who talk outside the company- been good in the past for broadband office etc. You may need to free register like this forum. All the best Ian

[Richard B]

This sounds poor! Along with a couple of colleagues, I'm using a 3 modem which I guess is a similar type of device, and despite a weak signal in the office we can all get HSDPA coverage. One of my colleagues has a similar problem with Outlook as he can't send NTL mail and I think I remember the reason for this - I don't think they (Orange) are allowing port 25 through (ie SMTP traffic).... assuming your email is with another provider?

As far as coverage goes.... put your postcode into this: http://www.sitefinder.ofcom.org.uk then click on the little triangles to see who's base station is near you. It explained why I used to get terrible Orange coverage at home so could select a more suitable network provider.

[Doug Stormforce]

Thanks Ian, signed up a couple of days ago but as yet no one has offered an answer. It does however highlight how much more user friendly the soft wear on this forum is compared with others and how much more helpful the members are.

Thanks Richard, very interesting, according to site finder there are fourmasts within 200m of my home, two within 100m, none however orange, the nearest orange mast is 3G and is just under 500m away, interestingly its pretty close to where we had our stand at the Southampton Boat Show where we had the same problem of crap signal (particularly frustrating when taking credit cards at the show). It was partly with boat shows in mind that I bought the regrettable ICON 225.

The question now is what sort of range should these base station/masts give; surely 500m should get a good signal? The one closest to me has an antenna height of 21m, although I see from the FAQs that this is the antenna height as opposed to height above ground level. Or is it a case of the more users sharing a mast the less strength and therfore range?

[codprawn]

I have had to sort out problems for people with these mobile devices loads of times. I find the best one of all is Vodafone - they even do a router now!!!

It's not a firewall problem you have is it?

[chewy]

Is your laptop searching for a wireless connection it can't find. Mine did this with the Icon and because it couldn't find a connection it displayed what your describing.
I turned my wireless off and it solved the problem and the net ran through orange instead.

Hope this helps?

[Poly]

doug - are you trying to send mail from an @orange.xyz type address or to relay from something like @stormforce.xyz ? One of my colleagues had a similar prob and could only send from @orange addresses using smtp.orange.... as relay way blocked. I believe port 25 is also blocked for other servers - so you can't use other "normal" servers. I think his work around was to use an smtp server which wasn't on the normal port 25 (587 rings a bell?).

[Doug Stormforce]

Thanks guys for your suggestions.

Cod

Don't thinks it’s a Firewall, as its not happening all of the time. However not something I have considered before.

Chewy

Negative, wireless is turned off. Does your ICON work all of the time? Do you use outlook?

Polwart

Yes its xyz@stormforce.biz My web hosting company suggested the same, I changed port to 5?? Can’t remember what the second 2 digits were (585 rings a bell!), but changed back to 25 after it did not help. Will try your 587 anyway.

Having done some web searching on this topic is appears I am not the only ICON 255 user with this problem, seems there are many users who can not send mail through outlook.

[Richard B]

What's the outgoing server (smtp) that you connect to? I hope it's not smtp.orangehome.co.uk 'cos you might be stuffed if it is!

[Doug Stormforce]

Signal seams to have become a lot better in the last 2 days, no idea why, I have not changed anything.

Outlook still remains a problem.

Richard

I have tried several options, the three semi successful are

smtp.orange.net
www.stormforce.biz and
mail@stormforce.biz

I say semi as from these three I can sometimes send to others with the same stormforce domian, howeve none talk to the rest of the world.

Very odd, I have pretty much resigned myslef to webmail

[Nasher]

I have recently had problems with my various POP3 accounts and my Orange account in outlook. I was tearing my hair out all one evening.

As Richard has mentioned I had to reset my SMTP server to orangehome.co.uk following an error message from outlook.

Initially this worked OK with my normal 'Orange' email address(actually an old freeserve account), but I could not get my POP3 accounts to work. ie my nasher@simonnash.co.uk POP3 account.

I called the Orange help line and explained the situation.
The guy on the other end of the line was very helpful, and ran through the process with me. We did exactly what I'd already tried, and it didn't work.
He left me on hold whilst he asked somebody else. When he came back we started again and it worked following something he did.
I was so happy it worked I didn't ask what he'd done, and just presumed he'd activated a priviledge or something on my account.

Nasher.

[chewy]

I don't use outlook and my Orange is fine, I never seem to have any problems although my Dads sometimes shuts itself down on its own.
We both have exactly the same laptops software etc.

[Nasher]

My outlook does everything I ask of it, the only issues I've had have always been caused by the ISP.

It copes with a generic email account that goes back to freeserve days, and various POP3 accounts from domains I have registered.

I wasn't overjoyed about the way Orange changed server names recently without any notice, but was impressed at the amount of help offered over the phone to sort out my Outlook/POP3 problems that had arisen when they changed them. This was all on the freephone number by the way.

Nasher

[Richard B]

Originally Posted by Doug Stormforce

I can sometimes send to others with the same stormforce domian, howeve none talk to the rest of the world.

Yep - that's expected (the second bit). It's a built in security feature to stop "relaying" where you can use an ISP to spam everyone else. ISPs don't like this as they get blamed for spam attacks. Understandable. Your stormforce hosting ISP seems quite friendly - they are listening on ports 25 and 587. They won't let me relay mail to you though as I'm connecting form a known dynamic ISP assigned IP range which is forbidden. Orange is less friendly - they are listening on port 25 only.

I think you need to do exactly what Nasher's done and hope you get the same friendly assistance!

[Doug Stormforce]

Originally Posted by Richard B

I think you need to do exactly what Nasher's done and hope you get the same friendly assistance!

Rich / Nash

As unsucssesful as this approach has been many times previously, I tried calling again this morning and we are now in business. A setting on the actual ICON softwear needed changing. All the time spent changing settings on outlook I was barking up the wrong tree.

Thanks for all your help and also thanks to Rick from Cosgrove who phoned with another solution.