Problems with amavisd (premature end of SMTP transaction)

Folks: When I installed the amavisd for use with Exim on my xserve (10.2.4, having upgraded perl to 5.8 as suggested after an abortive attempt with 5.6) i can't get it to receive mail properly from Exim (or any SMTP agent). Once the DATA phase on SMTP is finished, I get the response: [code:1:4b05d407a5]421 4.3.2 Service shutting down, closing channel[/code:1:4b05d407a5] (which should be an 'OK' to indicate that all is well if the transaction worked ok) Which basically means it didn't take the mail. I can repeat this and looking at the amavisd debug output there's not a lot of help as to what's going wrong - even with the debug level turned up to 5. Debug output is below. I've tried re-installing Perl and the whole lot from scratch to no avail. I know Exim is OK so I'm not reinstalling that. The only slight concern I have is the following line in the debug output when the amavisd starts: [code:1:4b05d407a5]Failed to create default user preference file /var/amavis/.spamassassin/user_prefs[/code:1:4b05d407a5] Although SpamAssasin docs imply that user_prefs is an 'optional' file (unless I've missed something major). Any thoughts ? ..iain -- iain at seatofthepants dot net --- debug output --> [code:1:4b05d407a5] Mar 9 20:33:41 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) SMTP< data\r\n Mar 9 20:33:41 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) SMTP:10024 /var/amavis/amavis-20030309T203333-02054: <iain@seatofthepants.net> -> <iain@rdg.org> Received: from ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (xserve-one [127.0.0.1:10024]) (amavisd-new) with SMTP id 02054-01 for <iain@rdg.org>; Sun, 9 Mar 2003 20:33:33 +0000 (GMT) Mar 9 20:33:41 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) SMTP> 354 End data with <CR><LF>.<CR><LF> Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) SMTP< .\r\n Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) body hash: 12ea50e7723c71ca3e906f56fc378b22 Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) Original mail size: 192; quota set to: 102400 bytes Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) Checking: <iain@seatofthepants.net> -> <iain@rdg.org> Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) Extracting mime components Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) Issued a new file name: part-00001 Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) mime_decode: Content-type: text/plain, name: Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) Charging 31 bytes to remaining quota 102400 (out of 102400, (0%)) - by mime_decode Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) prolong_timer after mime_decode: remaining time = 244 s Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) Checking for banned MIME types and names Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) check_for_banned - mime-type: text/plain Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) lookup_RE: key="text/plain", no match Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) lookup_acl: key="iain@rdg.org", no match Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) decode_parts: level=1, #parts=1 : part-00001 Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) tempdir being removed: /var/amavis/amavis-20030309T203333-02054 Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) rmdir_recursively: /var/amavis/amavis-20030309T203333-02054, excl= Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) rmdir_recursively: /var/amavis/amavis-20030309T203333-02054/parts, excl=0 Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2054]: (02054-01) SMTP> 421 4.3.2 Service shutting down, closing channel Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2053]: Net::Server: Starting "1" children Mar 9 20:34:37 xserve-one amavisd[2068]: Net::Server: Child Preforked (2068)[/code:1:4b05d407a5]