Setting up TCP/IP on your PC

How do I set the TCP/IP parameters in Windows?

These instructions assume your PC is connected to the Internet using an Ethernet network adapter and either a DSL modem or an ISDN router.

1. Double click on the Control Panel shortcut if you have one on your desktop, or select Settings>Control Panel from the Start menu.
2. Double click on the Network icon to start the Network applet.
3. If you are using Windows NT:
   1. Select the Protocols tab.
   2. Click to highlight TCP/IP.
   3. Click on the Properties button.
   4. Select the IP Address tab and click to highlight the appropriate network adapter in the Adapter box.
4. If you are using Windows 95/98:
   1. Select the Configuration tab.
   2. Click to highlight TCP/IP->xyz where "xyz" is the appropriate network adapter.
   3. Click on the Properties button.
5. You may need to use the Internet connection wizard to change your Internet connection from dialup networking to LAN.
6. You may need to set the Host and Domain names in the DNS tab.

IP address

This is found on the IP Address tab and should be set to the address we assigned to you. If you have a LAN with multiple PCs, each PC needs a different IP address. If you are using the Network Address Translation (NAT) feature of your ISDN router, or if you have a proxy that is performing NAT, then your network administrator will assign you a private IP address (such as 192.168.0.2) or will instruct you to configure your PC to obtain an address from a DHCP server.

Subnet mask

This is found on the IP Address tab and should be set to the netmask we assigned to you along with your IP address. If you are using NAT and static private addresses, then the netmask will probably be 255.255.255.0. The subnet mask is used along with the IP address to identify the network and host parts of the address.

Default Gateway

This is found on the IP Address tab and should be set to the gateway address we assigned to you along with your IP address. If you are using NAT, the gateway address will be the IP address of the LAN side of your NAT device (such as 192.168.0.1).

DNS

This is found on the DNS (Windows NT) or DNS Configuration (Windows 95/98) tab. DNS stands for Domain Name Service, and the DNS servers or "nameservers" look up hostnames and resolve them into numeric IP addresses. They can also determine where to send email from the portion of the email address after the @ sign, and they can do reverse lookups to determine what hostname corresponds to an IP address.

The first address in the search order is your primary DNS server and is required. The second address is your secondary DNS server, and is optional but recommended in case the primary nameserver is down.

Email

Setting up an email client

The following instructions are for Outlook Express. Other mail clients such as Eudora are set up in a similar manner.

1. Refer to the configuration sheet we sent you, and find the following information which you will need to set up your email client:
   1. User name (also referred to as account name)
   2. Password
   3. Email address
   4. Incoming (POP3/IMAP4) mail server
   5. Outgoing (SMTP) mail server
2. Select Tools>Accounts and click on Add>Mail.
3. Enter your name as you would like it to appear in the From: field of outgoing email (for example John Smith) and press Next.
4. Enter your email address (for example jsmith@mssinternet.com) and press Next.
5. Select whether you want to use POP3 or IMAP (see the next question if you are not sure which mode of operation to select).
6. Enter the incoming mail server (for example pop.mssinternet.com). This will typically be the same independent of whether you chose POP3 or IMAP.
7. Enter the outgoing mail server (for example smtp.mssinternet.com).
8. Do not check Secure Password Authentication.
9. Click Next and then Finish.

POP3 vs IMAP4

Email client-server operation typically uses either the POP3 or IMAP protocol. POP3 is older, simpler, and more common, and should probably be your choice if you can't decide. Email is typically downloaded to the client when you connect (although it can be left on the server), and all messages and attachments are downloaded at once. IMAP allows more flexibility to manage your mail and organize it into folders on the server, download and/or delete selected messages and/or attachments, and share a mailbox among users, in a manner similar to groupware packages like Lotus Notes. IMAP is also more tightly integrated with MIME.

Forwarding email

You can temporarily or permanently forward your email to an account on another server. Be careful, however, not to create a forwarding loop by setting up your accounts to forward mail to each other.

1. Use your web browser and go to the Personal Profile configuration webpage at http://www.mixedsignal.net/personal.
2. Enter your user name and password (the same ones you use for email).
3. Click the Email button on the left.
4. Enter the email account you want your messages forwarded to in the Forward Email To box.
5. Click on Save Changes.

Vacation reply

If you are going on vacation, you can set up an autoresponder to automatically respond to incoming email. The response message can tell people when you will return, instruct them to contact someone else in your absence, etc. Be sure to deactivate the autoresponder when you return.

1. Use your web browser and go to the Personal Profile configuration webpage at http://www.mssinternet/personal.
2. Enter your user name and password (the same ones you use for email).
3. Click the Email button on the left.
4. Enter your message in the Vacation/Autoresponder Email Reply box.
5. Check the box to the right of the question mark button, to activate the autoresponder.
6. Click on Save Changes.

Problems sending mail

1. Make sure you have the outgoing mail server configured correctly in your email client.
2. Make sure your password is configured correctly. Note passwords are case sensitive.
3. Make sure you are sending mail to the correct email address. Also check the syntax of the address, it should be of the form username@mailserver.domain.
4. If the recipient's mail server or mail relay is down or overloaded, you may receive a message saying that your sent mail has been undeliverable for 4 hours. Our mail server will continue trying to deliver your message once an hour, and if it is still undeliverable after 5 days, the message is returned to you.
5. If you notice a delay connecting to the mailserver when sending outgoing mail (but not when checking for incoming mail), you may need to have your network administrator open up TCP port 113 on your firewall. SMTP servers use the Ident protocol on port 113 to obtain the hostname of the sending computer. NAT proxies may route Ident requests to the default server rather than your computer. We have reduced the Ident timeout to 3 seconds on our servers to minimize the delay if your network does not respond to Ident requests.

Problems receiving mail

1. Make sure you have the incoming mail server configured correctly in your email client.
2. Make sure your password is configured correctly. Note passwords are case sensitive.
3. Make sure your Reply To: address is configured correctly, and that you are giving people the right email address.

Personal webpage

What is the URL for my personal webpage?

You can view your personal webpage with a web browser at http://www.mssinternet.com/users/xyz, where "xyz" is your username (same as for email).

How do I change my personal webpage?

Use an ftp client to upload to directory "/web" at hostname "www.mssinternet.com", using the same username and password as for email. Your default home page is index.html, you should overwrite it to change the home page. Remember to upload html files in ASCII mode and image files in binary mode.

What about backups of my web site?

1. Use your web browser and go to the Personal Profile configuration webpage at http://www.mssinternet.com/personal.
2. Enter your user name and password (the same ones you use for email).
3. Click the Backup button on the left.
4. Click on Backup My Home Directory.
5. If prompted by your web browser, choose Save To Disk.

Usenet newsgroups

Setting up a news reader

Set the news server to:  news.mssinternet.com

Can I read Usenet news on the Web?

Google acquired Deja.com, check out groups.google.com.

About MSS Internet

Where are you located?

Our administrative office and primary Internet POP are located at:

478 Pennsylvania Ave.
Suite 203
Glen Ellyn, IL 60137

Most of our equipment is actually in a data center in downtown Chicago, near the Sears Tower.

How to report outages, spam, etc.

How do I report a service outage?

Call our office at 630-942-1090. If there is no answer, call 630-333-5240 and leave a message with the phone number where a technician can reach you.

What if response times seem slow?

At peak periods, web servers become overloaded, as do the Internet backbone and the major peering points (especially MAE-East and MAE-West). This can result in slow downloads, server unavailable messages, and browser timeouts. Check several well-connected sites like Yahoo! in different parts of the country. If some sites are slow but others are OK, the sites or the Internet backbone are probably overloaded - try again later.

You can also run ping and traceroute tests to sites on our network (e.g. this website), the sites you are having trouble with, and major sites like Yahoo! and Google.

If you have a high-speed connection (DSL or T1), you may get faster performance by increasing your TCP window size from 8 kB to 32 kB. This requires adding a key to your Windows registry. If you are comfortable editing the registry, we can send you the information from Microsoft on increasing the window size.

What can I do about spam?

Unfortunately, a certain amount of unsolicited bulk email or "spam" must be expected and tolerated. In clear cases of abuse, you can usually send a complaint to the spammer's ISP using an email address of the form abuse@ispname.com, or you can look for a contact at www.abuse.net. Keep in mind, however, that most spam has a forged From: address and you need to look at IP addresses in the headers to determine the origin of the spam.

One common way for spammers to get your email address is from email lists or newsgroups you subscribe to. Commercial email listservers like YahooGroups are relatively safe, but posting to newsgroups will almost certainly get you on spam lists. These unsolicited emails may relate to the newsgroup and therefore to something you are interested in, or they may try to sell you adult oriented material or Viagra.

You should never reply to spam or follow the instructions for removing your address from their list. In most cases this will do nothing or actually cause you to receive more spam. If you must use your email address online to register products, buy online, post to discussion groups, sell on eBay, etc., then consider getting a "throwaway" email address that you can cancel when it starts getting too much spam.

If you believe that our network is being used to originate or relay spam, or if you are experiencing other problems related to email abuse, send an email to abuse@mssinternet.com.