OWA problem access.

[LittleFishy]

Hi, currently I have an issue with random client access to OWA, this is the situation. A user running XP on his laptop is able to access the internet in hotels etc (using his laptop), but OWA will just refuse him access. If he uses a hotel PC it works fine. I’ve always put this down to security settings at the hotels etc, but he is currently in our office in Jamaica and once again he can access the internet, but not OWA with his laptop wirelessly on their network and I know their security is low. Strangle enough he claims it works in Madrid airport. We have just upgraded to Exchange 2003, which may be a coincidence, but he claims he hasn’t made any changes to his laptop. Any help would be appreciated.

 

[Marcs41]

Nice description, but what is missing is WHAT kind of error does he get?

Marc
_{If 'something' 'somewhere' gives 'some' error, expect random guesses or no replies at all.
Free Tip: The F1 Key does NOT destroy your PC!}

 

[LittleFishy]

It will either will just sit there attempting to login until he gets bored of waiting, but normally it will just take him back to the login screen. I should of added that it appears he can access our internal intranet site, which uses the same login information (can't confirm this as it's a bit early in Jamaica at the moment).

 

[LittleFishy]

Apologies, but having probed the situation more with the user, it appears that he can’t actually get to the OWA page up, it just gives him unavailable, but as I said previously if he went on another machine it would work. This seems to have happened since we upgraded from Exchange 2000 to 2003 about a month ago. Are there any possible settings in his IE that have been affected by the Exchange change?

 

[kopja]

I had the same situation with one user, from home location using Comcast. The only way she could log-in to OWA was with Firefox. (IE would simply not let her login). Sorry but I was never able to figure out why IE would not work and Firefox did, and that happened only at the user's home (It worked fine on trips, and a few airports).

Have the user try Firefox and see what happens.

 

[Marcs41]

if he went on another machine it would work

That should prove you it is not an Exchange issue!

As for a solution, difficult to say if we are not in front of it.

Firefox or any other 'workaround' may help you out, but it is not a fix.

Marc
_{If 'something' 'somewhere' gives 'some' error, expect random guesses or no replies at all.
Free Tip: The F1 Key does NOT destroy your PC!}

 

[blakey2]

Few thoughts:

Is port 443 blocked by a f/w at any of the locations? - Assume you are using https to connect to webmail?? If you have an 80 to 443 redirect then this may be why timing out...

How confident are you that the laptop is clean from viruses/malware/spyware etc. If infected plenty of reasons as to why it might not connect - corrupt IP stack, hosts file entries..

Just a thought..

 

[LittleFishy]

The Firefox solution seemed to work, so I'm guessing it's some setting in IE. And no there is no mention of 443 in the firwall config.

 

[Marcs41]

Reset the IE to the default settings and fine-tune again, it may solve it without much hassle.

Marc
_{If 'something' 'somewhere' gives 'some' error, expect random guesses or no replies at all.
Free Tip: The F1 Key does NOT destroy your PC!}