Fix: Apple Mail and BT Internet “Won’t Send Emails”

For a big number of users, using a BT router to send e-mail via Apple Mail simply stopped working at a certain point. The issue affects a lot of users, and it is connected to the way mail searches for the DNS. Fortunately, there are a few things that you can do to solve this, as mail is something that people use on a daily basis.

Method 1: Specify the DNS on the Mac

This method will work absolutely fine as long as you don’t change the settings in the future, and BT don’t retire the DNS server you add.

1. Click the Apple icon from the top bar, and open System Preferences.
   
2. Open Network, select if its wireless or Ethernet, and click Advanced
   
3. Click DNS, and click the plus button to add the DNS servers.
4. Add two servers, for example 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4

Method 2: Change the host name on the router

This is another option, that will work for the hostname you change, for the router it’s connected to. If you connect to another hub 3, you will need to update the hostname again.

1. Open Safari and type the router’s IP address in the address bar – 192.168.1.254.
2. Click Settings, enter your password and go to Advanced settings -> Business Network or Home Network.
3. You will see a list of computers that have been connected to this router in the past and those that are currently connected, identify yours. If you cannot identify yours, disconnect all other devices with yours connected only and then view the active one. Once identified, it should look like “unknown-xx:xx-etc”
4. Click on it and rename it without any special characters. The new name should be something simple, one word and no punctuation, for example Homemac or something similar.

Method 3: Change the name of the Mac

Seeing as the issue is within the hostname of the machine, setting a hostname with no spaces or punctuation should work for any connection.

1. Open a Terminal from Finder -> Applications -> Utilities
   
   
   
2. In the Terminal, type in the following command: scutil –set HostName NEWHOSTNAME, where NEWHOSTNAME is what you want to call your Mac. It must begin with a letter, and can contain only letters and numbers. It would be good if you could keep it under 64 characters.
   
3. Click on the Apple icon, then System Preferences, and open If you can’t see Sharing, click the Show All button at the top, and it will appear.
4. Click Edit in the window that appears. Inside, set the Local Hostname to the name you previously wrote for your Mac in the terminal.
5. Now reboot your Mac and test.