Can't Send Email - started this morning

Checked Anti-virus program, Avast. Had an update in the que. Performed the update, restarted computer, outgoing email works again. I had restarted the computer a couple of times before and that had not fixed the email issue. Was the anti-virus update the solution, or did Comcast happen to fix a problem at that moment? Will likely never know. Has anyone had a similar issue?

I hope you're right. However, I've frequently gotten that message over the years, tried again, and it works immediately. I've also had it happen for an hour or so, retrying doesn't help, but then it starts working again without any restart or antivirus update. It makes me think the Comcast server occasionally takes its good old time reviewing the email and then it's timing out on their end or my end. I'd love to see a Comcast employee with knowledge of this interaction between our computers or other devices and their servers. Sometimes an incoming message will take hours before it shows up on my computer. Is this the same thing, in reverse?

I think it has something to do with the handshake between Comcast's servers and our outgoing mail. Perhaps they are trying to stop people who send out mass emails or malicious emails. I just wish Comcast technicians had the competence or authority to see this as an issue for us and would diagnose and fix the proplem. This has been an issue for years if you look at this and other forums. The good news is that I could still send out email this morning. Just waiting for the next incidence. Anyone who says they have "solved" the problem is kidding themselves.

Feel free to be cynical, but I've never had this "can't send email" problem in the ~20 years I've had Comcast as my ISP. This week was the first time I ever encountered it, and as mentioned it was the AVG email protection service the blocked outgoing emails. Kinda weird, I thought it was only to protect me from infected incoming email, which is the sort of help I need - no idea who they think they're protecting by allowing incoming email but blocking outgoing email while an update is pending upon a reboot.

You make a good point - where the   are the Comcast/Xfinity techs that used to regularly respond to questions/problems in the old version of help forums? Nobody minding the store here - that's a huge step backwards while our bills continue to go up every year!

Thanks, Daniel. I think you've made my point that the problem is systemic and Comcast needs to treat it as an issue on their end. I recognize they have to account for many types of devices interacting with their email servers. However, they need to take problems seriously and try to recognize that they might be the problem. I've gone to their support pages to see how to set up Thunderbird as my mail client, maybe find some recent changes in the instructions. The instructions are for Thunderbird 16.0 and higher. Thunderbird is on version 60.6.1. The setup pages and choices don't look anything like the current Thunderbird client. Can't they keep current? It strongly suggests they don't care about their customers. Their silence on this thread also speaks volumes.

Comcast changed the POP3 server settings? What ports were affected? I'm using smtp.comcast.net on port 465 for outgoing mail, have used those settings for many, many years.

Just tried to send an email. Timed out twice and then sent on the third try. Did not close program, just hit send three times. On the third try, it went.

Are there any Comcast employees monitoring this site? We'd love to have you weigh in....