"Too many simultaneous connections" error with Gmail after SP2 update

Anonymous
2012-04-23T09:00:02+00:00

Ever since updating to SP2, I regularly receive these errors from Outlook:

Mail could not be received at this time.

The server for account "Gmail" returned the error "[ALERT] Too many simultaneous connections. (Failure)." Your username/password or security settings may be incorrect. Would you like to try re-entering your password?

I'm connecting to my Gmail account via IMAP. As you would expect, re-entering my password as suggested by the error doesn't resolve the error and it continues to pop up every 10 seconds until I quit and re-lauch Outlook. I suspect it's something to do with the way this new version of Outlook handles multiple connections to the same IMAP server?

Is anyone else seeing this?

Outlook | MacOS | Legacy Outlook for Mac | For business

Locked Question. This question was migrated from the Microsoft Support Community. You can vote on whether it's helpful, but you can't add comments or replies or follow the question.

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Anonymous
2015-03-13T03:37:03+00:00

from Google

Too many simultaneous connections

If you have multiple users frequently accessing the same account or more than one IMAP client accessing Gmail at the same time, you may reach a connection threshold and receive the error message, 'Too many simultaneous connections.'

Gmail currently has a limit of 15 simultaneous IMAP connections per account.

Please note that your mail client may actually open multiple connections in the background. This means it's possible to reach a connection threshold simply by using only two mail clients to access the same account at the same time.

If you often use multiple mail clients or mobile devices with the same Gmail account, we recommend closing and/or signing out of any mail clients you're not actively using.

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Anonymous
2012-07-12T01:52:12+00:00

Microsoft appears to have released an update that deals with this problem: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2721015

Specifically, MS says that:

<ul><br><li>This update fixes an issue where some users who have IMAP accounts intermittently receive a “Too many simultaneous connections” error. A setting is now available to control the polling interval that Outlook uses with IMAP servers. <br><br><br><br>To adjust this setting, select <b>Tools</b>, select <b>Accounts</b>, and then select <b>Advanced </b>for the IMAP account. The setting defaults to synchronize all lMAP folders every two minutes. </li></ul>

I updated MS Office on both my iMac and MacBook Air, and I didn't change the new default synchronization setting. The iMac only occasionally had this problem, and I cannot tell if the problem has gone away completely yet on that computer.

On my MacBook Air, I had resorted to deleting my Gmail accounts as I could access them via Apple Mail desktop application and I really didn't need Outlook functions with Gmail. I started to add back my Gmail accounts, but I was getting the error message again. I turned off synchronization of IMAP folder while my mail downloaded, and the error message went away. After all my old email was downloaded, I turned IMAP folder synchronization back on (at the default 2 minutes).

It seems to have solved the problem for the most part. If you still get the error message, GMail folders may still be synchronizing, so you might have to keep hitting "No" a while longer until everything is synchronized.

So, with all due respect, it looks like it was a Microsoft problem after all. Fortunately I didn't try that time-consuming, tortuous fix recommended earlier.

I'll post an update on whether this fix has continued to work.

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  1. Anonymous
    2013-05-23T18:23:30+00:00

    If you are using gmail with Outlook, then you are likely to have folders in Outlook, unless you use POP, instead of IMAP.

    Inbox, Sent Items, Junk, etc... are all folders that sync with Gmail while using IMAP.

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  2. Anonymous
    2013-05-23T14:57:28+00:00

    I don't have folders in the gmail account that I sync with in Outlook for Mac so am I right in thinking that your workaround won't help me to tracj down the rogue emails with attachments?

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  3. Anonymous
    2013-05-23T13:38:15+00:00

    We may be on to something!

    Here is what we found, and this is still work in progress…

    When we migrate email folders from Outlook 2011 for Mac to Gmail, over IMAP, some messages do not sync well. Outlook will repeatedly attempt to sync those messages, and will never succeed. If there are too many folders with such messages, Outlook will run out of allowed concurrent IMAP connections to Gmail. This is because, each folder synchronization process consumes one connection. Outlook tries to synchronize multiple folders at once. Once a connection is refused by google, Outlook will prompt the user to try an put the password in again, as a possible solution for the connection refusal.

    So far we found that some messages with attachment, will never sync successfully between outlook and gmail.

    The workaround was to Forward Special the message as an attachment to oneself. Now the problematic message is re-wrapped, and will sync well. we then replaced the original message with the new one, for archival purposes.

    The tool we used to troubleshoot, was the Outlook 2011 for Mac Progress window. We would watch it and see how the same folders were repeatedly syncing, with alway a message or two still to be done, without any change we made to the particular folder.

    We know when a folder is fixed, by manually syncing it with a Right-Click -> "Synchronize Now", and expecting no activity on the Progress window.

    Hope that helps you guys.

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