Mail App and Gmail SMTP

Since buying my new MBP almost every time I try to send out an email through my IMAP Gmail account using Mail.App it asks me for my password. I enter it and the mail sends, but it also leaves a copy in drafts (sometimes). When a copy goes into draft it sometimes pops up again after I delete it.

I've formatted my HD (not for this reason, because this computer is a lemon I think), and I've quadruple checked my settings and password. It does this for all 3 of my gmail accounts.

My port settings is 993 and SSL checked and IDLE command checked.

Note: when I'm prompted to enter my password I never check store in KeyChain. I have never stored passwords on my computer before.

Any particular reason you're not storing your GMail password? It will make this process much more smooth.

Mail saves emails in Drafts for one reason or another. Generally, this happens because an email is saved. However, sometimes emails are stored there for other reasons. If you see that it's been sent out, you can delete it from your Drafts folder.

I'm getting the same problem - I think it started after we upgraded our iMac to OSX 10.6.8 (Snow Leopard). Randomly, messages would go into Drafts, and I wasn't sure if they had been sent or not (even though they appeared in the Sent Folder).
Now I'm getting the STMP message where I have to enter my password. But even after entering it correctly, it still won't sent out my emails.

This must be a problem on the Mac, as I'm able to successfully send and receive emails from my iPad.

Judging by the number of messages on this topic, it seems to affecting loads of people. Come on Apple - this is a serious problem - the most common thing people do with their computers is to send emails and if it's not working, it's a major hassle.

No, it's not a serious problem. Unless "users who don't know what they are doing" can be counted as a serious problem.

I've had a GMail account for years, and it works normally (as it has for years) on my Mac. I think almost everyone here likely has a GMail account, and yet this is the first thread I've ever seen here (and I've been here two years) that claims this problem is not user or ISP error.

PS. Messages don't "randomly" go into drafts. They are put there if the message has been composed but not sent (first appears after a few seconds of inactivity), and appear there automatically until they are successfully sent.

Hi chas_m,

Thanks for your not very helpful comment. Although I may call myself dumb mum, I was probably fixing software bugs while you were in diapers, so a little more respect, please!

I too have been successfully using Gmail on my iMac for over 2 years, but quite suddenly it has been doing strange things e.g. saving things in drafts even if it has actually been sent out. This has only started to happen after we upgraded the OS and therefore leads me to suspect that it is a bug in the OS.

Separate problem - and rather more serious - is that I cannot send out any emails from my Mail. This causes me hassle because I maintain a contacts list in my Address book to contact my clients when I need to send a group email. Other emails I can respond to by logging in via Safari to my Gmail account.

This is a real error and I am not the only one experiencing it. There are several threads on this forum which relate to the same (or similar) issue, but no-one seems to be able to come up with a categoric solution.

Today I tried playing around with various settings on my outgoing mail preferences, so that they match those of my husband (who is set up as another user on the same Mac and is not having these issues) but to no avail. He is using POP rather than iMap.

If you have any helpful solutions I would be interested to hear them.