mx, dns, ...

Ormrr · 9 Mar 2005, 08:59 PM

Could someone care to explain me what is the difference between changing mx and dns settings. I mean that some email hosting companies like runbox only ask you to change mx settings and don't apparently care about dns settings. At the same time several others (like fusemail) ask you to change the dns settings as well. Is one of the solutions better than the other?

p.s. I host my email currently at runbox and it works fine as it did with my previous host (where I had to change dns).

***Edwin*** · 9 Mar 2005, 09:43 PM

DNS is the generic term for all domain-related settings.

MX is for email.

"CName" and "A" records are for websites.

An email provider should only need you to update the MX portion of your domain name's DNS record (that's an example of both terms in 1 sentence)

Hope that helps!

carverrn · 9 Mar 2005, 10:13 PM

As Edwin said, the MX (Mail Exchange) Records are the part of the DNS (Domain Name Server) entries for your domain that deal with handling email.

When a server wants to send a message to your domain it must know where to send the message. The MX Record tells the sending server which server is receiving messages for your domain. Once it knows this it can send the message on to that server.

The DNS entries are usually maintained on DNS server of the registrar you get your domain name through. So to change the MX Record for your domain you would probably login to your account at your registrar and use their facilities for editing the your domain's DNS settings.

For Runbox to host your domain you also have to add your domain at Runbox so that the Runbox servers know what to do with messages for your domain. If you don't setup Runbox for your domain then the Runbox servers think the messages are trying to be "relayed" through them to another server and the messages will be rejected by Runbox (a "relay denied" error).

Other entries in the DNS handle things like what servers are hosting the web site for the domain. So you can easily have the web site for a domain hosted by the web servers of one company and the email for that domain hosted by email servers of another company.

Regards,
Rich

tore · 9 Mar 2005, 10:17 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Edwin
"CName" and "A" records are for websites.

Not entirely correct, an A record is generic and can be used for any kind of mapping of hostnames to IP addresses, independent of which service an user would associate with that hostname. CNAMES are similar in usage, too.

Case in point: An MX record must always point to an A record, such as for instance mx.runbox.com.

Tore

9 Mar 2005, 08:59 PM	#1
Ormrr Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Posts: 55	mx, dns, ... Could someone care to explain me what is the difference between changing mx and dns settings. I mean that some email hosting companies like runbox only ask you to change mx settings and don't apparently care about dns settings. At the same time several others (like fusemail) ask you to change the dns settings as well. Is one of the solutions better than the other? p.s. I host my email currently at runbox and it works fine as it did with my previous host (where I had to change dns).

9 Mar 2005, 09:43 PM	#2
*Edwin* Administrator Join Date: Aug 2001 Location: UK Posts: 3,118	DNS is the generic term for all domain-related settings. MX is for email. "CName" and "A" records are for websites. An email provider should only need you to update the MX portion of your domain name's DNS record (that's an example of both terms in 1 sentence) Hope that helps!

9 Mar 2005, 10:13 PM	#3
carverrn Intergalactic Postmaster Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: Chicago, IL Posts: 5,606 Representative of: Runbox.com	As Edwin said, the MX (Mail Exchange) Records are the part of the DNS (Domain Name Server) entries for your domain that deal with handling email. When a server wants to send a message to your domain it must know where to send the message. The MX Record tells the sending server which server is receiving messages for your domain. Once it knows this it can send the message on to that server. The DNS entries are usually maintained on DNS server of the registrar you get your domain name through. So to change the MX Record for your domain you would probably login to your account at your registrar and use their facilities for editing the your domain's DNS settings. For Runbox to host your domain you also have to add your domain at Runbox so that the Runbox servers know what to do with messages for your domain. If you don't setup Runbox for your domain then the Runbox servers think the messages are trying to be "relayed" through them to another server and the messages will be rejected by Runbox (a "relay denied" error). Other entries in the DNS handle things like what servers are hosting the web site for the domain. So you can easily have the web site for a domain hosted by the web servers of one company and the email for that domain hosted by email servers of another company. Regards, Rich