Mail Server confusion - Setup with dedicated IP number?

    Hi there. In recent years, primarily to lighten the load across various domains on a small vServer, we've always used a specific domain that served as a mail server exclusively. The existing email accounts on that server may have been from half a dozen domains, but all of them used the same mail server settings of another domain. However, now and then this caused mail delivery errors with some servers such as AT&T and others.


    Since we just purchased a brand new vServer package (Linux with Debian 9) last week, this time around we also opted to purchase a second IP number for that server, in order to utilize that particular IP exclusively for the mail server and email accounts from the domains on that server. By using a dedicated IP number for the email server as well as all of the emails contained in the various domains, we're hoping to eliminate any mail delivery errors once and for all. Problem is, we've never tried using a dedicated IP number for our mail server before and we're a bit stuck, hoping to find some assistance here.


    I have a beginning admin who's helping me with this and we have the mail server working, but in Thunderbird for example, the incoming/outgoing mails server settings aren't working with the IP number. When we try using the IP number, we receive Security/Certificate Warnings. Yes, I googled Thunderbird mail settings extensively but could only find a post from 2011 which showed a screenshot with precisely what we're doing ... just having the IP number itself in the fields for incoming/outgoing mail server. This is 2018 though and those settings don't appear to work anymore.


    But that's why I'm here, because I'm beginning to suspect that something was entered incorrectly either in the Registrar's DNS settings, the mail server installation of the server setup with Debian 9, and/or the mail server settings within i-MSCP. Would someone please be so kind and point me in the right direction for the Debian 9, i-MSCP, and Thunderbird settings? I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you.


    .

    Assuming that you're using Bind9 (DNS server managed by i-MSCP:

    • The mail server IP is always the primary server IP, that is the IP set during i-MSCP setup. That is the base server IP: cat /etc/imscp/imscp.conf | grep BASE_SERVER_IP
    • In you mail client, you need user the server hostname for both SMTP, IMAP (or POP) servers
    • You need enable SSL for the i-MSCP services ( FTP, SMTP, IMAP/POP). You can do that easily with the LetsEncrypt plugin at admin level.

    BTW: You don't give us sufficient details. See Reporting rules - Reminder


    See aslo bind9 DNS template: https://github.com/i-MSCP/imsc…ian/bind/parts/db.tpl#L22

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    Thank you. Everything is working correctly and apparently the error was strictly on the Thunderbird portion of the settings along with some migration-lag for settings to be taken over on the new server. After waiting a couple of hours and making a simple adjustment to each Thunderbird account, followed by closing/restarting TB, everything was fine. Have a great Sunday.

    It sounds like you’re on the right track with using a dedicated IP for your mail server to avoid delivery errors. The security warnings in Thunderbird when using the IP instead of the domain name are likely due to mismatches between the IP and the SSL certificate, which typically matches the domain name. You may want to ensure that the SSL certificate on the mail server is correctly configured for the domain name associated with the IP. For affordable solutions, you might also want to explore cheap dedicated hosting options from HostNoc, which could offer the flexibility you need.