XAMPP external SMTP Server

[ibizamale]

Hiya guys.

I have XAMPP 1.7.3 running on a windows 2003 server.

We have an account with authsmtp.com, i would like to configure the system to send mail via this account. I am having trouble as this smtp server requres authentication. I have messed with the php.ini and the sendmail.ini

I require this so i can send emails from my websites on the same server

PHP.INI

[mail function]
; For Win32 only.
; http://php.net/smtp
SMTP = mail.authsmtp.com
; http://php.net/smtp-port
smtp_port = 25
username = xxxxxx
password = xxxxxx

; For Win32 only.
; http://php.net/sendmail-from
;sendmail_from = postmaster@localhost

; For Unix only. You may supply arguments as well (default: "sendmail -t -i").
; http://php.net/sendmail-path
;sendmail_path = "\"C:\xampp\sendmail\sendmail.exe\" -t"

; Force the addition of the specified parameters to be passed as extra parameters
; to the sendmail binary. These parameters will always replace the value of
; the 5th parameter to mail(), even in safe mode.
;mail.force_extra_parameters =

SENDMAIL.INI

# Example for a user configuration file

# Set default values for all following accounts.
defaults
logfile "C:\xampp\sendmail\sendmail.log"

# Mercury
account Mercury
host mail.authsmtp.com
from me@me.com
auth on
auth_username=xxxxxx
auth_password=xxxxxx

# A freemail service example
account Hotmail
tls on
tls_certcheck off
host smtp.live.com
from [exampleuser]@hotmail.com
auth on
user [exampleuser]@hotmail.com
password [examplepassword]

# Set a default account
account default : Mercury

auth_username=xxxxxx
auth_password=xxxxxxx

I know there is some mistakes here, but i was wondering if the solution is simple.

Also i have enabled Mercury but cannot open the admin area, the button on the control panel just clicks.

Thank you in advance for you help

[MC10]

You need to set the sendmail_path to where your sendmail.exe is, plus an -t at the end, just like it is like right now.