In this tutorial I will instruct you how to get a you@your_domain.com e-mail address for $15 a year. There are no catches, no strings attached, no nonsense. You can get reliable domain-style e-mail this cheap and you don’t even need a web host.
The steps below will instruct you how to do this.
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Everyone has heard of Hotmail and Gmail. Both of these e-mail services are widely known and widely used.
Both these services offer e-mail for your domain. With Hotmail, the service is Windows Live Domains. With Gmail, the service is Google Apps.
Most people are of the belief that if you want to use either of these services with a domain (i.e. YourDomain.com instead of hotmail.com or gmail.com) you have to have a web host first.
Not true.
You can in fact pay only for the domain registration itself and have the mail hosted by Windows Live Domains or Google Apps completely free. What you need to do is use Free DNS Hosting.
Two very reliable DNS hosts are EditDNS and ZoneEdit. For the example here we will use EditDNS.
Advantages of using free DNS hosting:
- Free (obviously)
- Ability to federate identities. This means if you use Hotmail, you@yourdomain.com will work as a screen name in Windows Live Messenger. If you use Google Apps, you@yourdomain.com will work as a Google Talk screen name.
- Ability to add web hosting later if you choose.
- Ability the domain name or subdomain name for your e-mail.
- Your only cost is the yearly domain registration fee which is usually not more than $15 annually for dot-com/net/org in the USA.
Before continuing:
Remember that when you use a free DNS hosting service, you must use their DNS servers. With EditDNS these are servers ns1.us.editdns.net, ns2.us.editdns.net and ns3.us.editdns.net.
Setting up Google Apps
With EditDNS, setting up Google Apps doesn’t get any easier. Once you add your domain to your account, just click Setup Google Apps. All the information will be entered automatically for you.
I have a spare domain menga.org that I will show as an example:
Your Gmail for your domain should start working roughly 24 hours after you get your records set up as shown above.
The only difficult part at this point is federating your identity so you can use Google Talk. This thread will tell you what SRV records you need to insert into your DNS in order for this to work. There are quite a few of them.
Adding an SRV record to your EditDNS account for your domain is more difficult than it looks, but once you do it it’s relatively easy.
All the server names are here. However it can be very confusing as how to add these to your account.
Here’s how:
One of the records is this:
_xmpp-server._tcp.gmail.com. IN SRV 20 0 5269 xmpp-server1.l.google.com.
The first address needs to be changed to reflect menga.org (you would use your example domain) when added. The rest is easy.
It looks like this:
Following each of the above:
- _xmpp-server._tcp.gmail.com. was adjusted to _xmpp-server._tcp.menga.org (USE YOUR DOMAIN, not menga.org)
- IN SRV means this is an SRV record so Type was selected as SRV.
- There is a 20 after SRV, so the AUX is 20.
- TTL is proper, set to 86400, which is 1 hour.
- IP/Host is the remainder of the record. In this case, 0 5269 xmpp-server1.l.google.com
Yes, this sounds very confusing but once you enter in a few of these it’s relatively simple.
When finished, you will have an account that looks similar to this (note all the SRV record additions):
Thankfully, you only have to do this stuff once and it will work.
Your Google Talk should start working in roughly less than 24 hours after you enter in these records.
Setting up Windows Live Domains
The Microsoft way of doing things is far easier as there aren’t even half as many records that are needed.
When logged into your Windows Live Domains account, the instructions state you only need to set up the following (located under Domain Settings after you login to your Admin account for Windows Live Domains):
- One MX record
- One Sender ID Configuration (not necessary but recommended)
- One Messenger Configuration (the SRV so you can use the Windows Live Messenger)
…and that’s it. Very simple.
Like Google Apps, the hardest part is setting up the federation. Fortunately if you use Windows Live Domains it only requires one SRV entry instead of 10.
And it looks like this in EditDNS (using my personal domain menga.net as an example):
That’s all you need. This information will be listed under Domain Settings when logged into your Windows Live Domains admin account.
Like Google Apps, it takes about 24 hours after you enter these records before everything starts working. But when it does it works like a champ.
Performance
This method of doing domain e-mail is just as good as if you hosted it elsewhere. You get all the perks of Gmail or Hotmail (whichever you choose) and it won’t cost you one red cent to use it.
Your only cost is to your domain registrar.
Final notes
For Windows Live Domains, you must login to your account at least once every 90 days to keep the account “alive”, else you will lose it. This is for any account you set up in that system.
It is highly suggested you set up a CNAME record in EditDNS to point to a mail subdomain so you can login easily.
If using Windows Live Domains:
Set up a record as follows:
- Record name: mail.yourdomain.com
- Type: CNAME
- AUX: 1
- TTL: 86400
- IP/Host: go.domains.live.com
If using Google Apps:
Set up a record as follows:
- Record name: mail.yourdomain.com
- Type: CNAME
- AUX: 1
- TTL: 86400
- IP/Host: ghs.google.com
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