.Mac Servers Restored

Apple's .Mac servers were improperly functioning for most of Monday morning, delivering "authentication failed" errors for e-mail accounts, and the .Mac Web site has been inaccessible returning a "Gateway Timeout" message.

Apple has now restored service, and the company's technical support department offers the following explanation, and says it is replace:

"There was a network outage due to faulty hardware from 6:30am to 9:30am PDT this morning. We have restored access to the .Mac site and services. Email messages that are expected at this time may take longer to be delivered than normal. We apologize for any inconvenience that this may cause, and want to assure you that no mail has been lost by the .Mac servers. "

"We hope you haven't been greatly inconvenienced by the two .Mac network outages we've experienced in the past two weeks (including this morning) and we sincerely apologize for any problems you've experienced. The outages were the result of equipment failures, and since the equipment vendor has not been able to persuade us that the problem will not occur again, we've already begun installing new equipment from a different vendor. "