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kaushal2004Flag for United States of America

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Reconfigure MX Record at Registrar

ok....my MX record at my registrar (godaddy) somehow got messed up.  i don't remember the exact settings but now i am not getting any emails.  what should have been my MX record be.....how do i fix it?

i am running Exchange 2003 on 'Windows 2003.
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bluetab

Your MX record should point to the FQDN of your mail server: mail.domain.com
Then create an A record that points your mail.domain.com to the Public IP
If you don't have any records of what the Public IP is for your mail server you can check your router to see what Public IP is NAT'd to the internal IP address of the mail server.  Then just login to your GoDaddy website and make the necessary changes as stated above.
If you know what your mail server IP address is you can doa "ping -a xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx" it from the outside just to make sure it resolves correctly.  You should also be able to test what your mail server IP is
MX records are made up of two parts.
A host - which needs to be an A record. A CNAME or alias will not be enough.
The host will point to your static external IP address. For example you would create a host of mail, give it your external IP address and then you would have mail.domain.com.

Then the MX record points to the host. So your MX record would be mail.domain.com.

MX records are NOT IP addresses, or CNAMEs.

Simon.
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let me show what i currently have.  All was working fine until yesterday.  

domain:  nktsinha.com
static IP = 74.95.193.105

Exchange server host name:  exchange.xagosoft.com (192.198.1.48)
Mail Relay server host name:  bdc-relay.xagosoft.com (192.168.1.49)
Port 25 open to:  bdc-relay.xagosoft.com

Internal DNS
MailExchanger=same as parent folder=10=exchange.xagosoft.com

External DNS (at godaddy)
A Record
Host = @
Points to = 74.95.193.105
----------------------
CNAME
Host = nktsinha.com
Points to = @
----------------------
MX
Priority = 10
Host = @
Goes to = exchange.xagosoft.com

This is all the config I have.  So what am i missing or what looks out of line.  Need help as all mails are currently being bounced back or has "fatal error" when sending email to my domain from outside.
What the world can see for your MX records is not what you have posted above.

http://www.dnsreport.com/tools/dnsreport.ch?domain=nktsinha.com

It looks like you have put in a loop of CNAME records.

exchange.xagosoft.com does not exist in any public DNS records.

It looks like your DNS records for both that domain and for the xagosoft.com domain are not correct.

It looks like you have posted internal DNS records above. What you have internal is not used by the internet - 192.168.x.x is not valid for internet DNS.

Simon.
Simon,

I have posted both internal DNS info and external DNS info for your information.

Ok....it seems quite bad here, doesn't it.  So where do I start.  What happened with my DNS at the registrar that the world cannot see me.

How badly am I bruised or wasted?  :)
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Sembee
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Simon,

I want to just work with one domain at a time to make sure it reports correctly before I change the other.  Currently I just want to work with "nktsinha.com".  This domain is only for mail.  No FTP or WWW are being hosted and so I am not worried about those enteries.

Also, before I had CNAME setup so that I could access my OWA.  The CNAME I had working also has my SSL certificate pointing to it.  So I don't want to loose that CNAME name.

So basically you are saying that I should wipe most information clean on my external DNS control panel and work clean with A record and MX record....Correct?
CNAME is just an alias.
You can use the same name that you were using on a CNAME to another host as an address. You don't have to wipe the existing settings clean, but if you don't think they are correct then remove them and replace them with new settings.

Simon.
ok..so this what i have at my registrar right now...  is this correct?

Host Points To TTL Actions
@ 74.95.193.105 1 Hour  
 
   
 CNAMES (Aliases)  
Host Points To TTL Actions
nktsinha.com @ 1 Hour    
 
   
 MX (Mail Exchange)  
Priority Host Goes To TTL Actions
10 @ exchange.xagosoft.com 1 Hour  
 
other question is that....should MX record be pointing to:

exchange.xagosoft.com   OR
bdc-relay.xagosoft.com

CNAME entry has been removed also.

so right now, I only have the following:

A (Host) Host Points To TTL Actions
@ 74.95.193.105 1 Hour  
 
 MX (Mail Exchange)  
Priority Host Goes To TTL Actions
10 @ exchange.xagosoft.com 1 Hour
Have you corrected the DNS on xagosoft.com so that exchange.xagosoft.com resolves?

Simon.
Yes i did.....it looks clean but shouldn't MX be pointing to the Mail Relay Server since port 25 is open to the Mail Relay server?
It doesn't resolve when I use any of the nslookup tools. Technically you should wait 48 hours for DNS changes to fully propagate, so it might be too quick.

MX records look fine now. I can see those. It is just an issue with exchange.xagosoft.com not resolving.

Simon.
before, i used to get bounce back messages from yahoo account to my domain.  now the message is sent but disappears.  i am assuming it is being queud.

Simon.....should it be exchange.xagosoft.com OR bdc-relay.xagosoft.com in MX records?
It should be whatever resolves correctly to the correct IP address.
The email you have sent to date has probably been queued somewhere.

Simon.
but mails are first hitting the bdc-relay.xagosoft.com before being passed on to exchange.xagosoft.com.  bdc-relay is the mailrelay/spam filtering application in front of Exchange server.
You didn't explain that anywhere.
If the emails should be hitting another machine first, then that is the machine that should be listed in the MX records for both domains. The exchange... variant should not be listed anywhere else.

Simon.
the server info and IP addresses was mentioned in detail config in my first comment above except i did not mention the role.  sorry about that.
thanks....let me make that change then.
mail is not flowing in yet.  but at the same time, it is not being rejected because of my 2nd and 3rd and 4th backup MX records
That probably means the messages are stuck on those servers.
The DNS report on your domain is reporting no A record for bdc-relay.xagosoft.com - you need to check the DNS records for that domain.

Simon.
yikes.....do i need to make additional A record entry at my registrar's DNS control panel?
but i don't understand.  there can be only one A record and I do have that entry pointing to my static IP

what other information is required?
An A record for what?
It should be for the specific host of bdc-relay in the domain xagosoft.com. Do not rely on any kind of wild card (@) to provide the host.

Simon.
ok....done.  i guess we have to wait and see.....

thanks for that info.
The DNS report is now showing a successful connection to your server.

Simon.
yes it is and my mail is flowing but now i cannot access OWA, since i had cleaned up my DNS info and started all over.
Have you setup DNS entries and your firewall to allow access to OWA?

Simon.
OK....I got everything working now.  Entered my info back in CNAME and now I have access to OWA over SSL as before.

Last question:  Do i even need to keep my A record with wild card?  Currently I have 2 entries for A record.  One with wild card and then other pointing to bdc-relay.xagosoft.com.

Thanks
hmmmm.....i thought OWA was working, but it doesn't.

DNS entry has been made with CNAME

Firewall has all the right ports open...Port 443.  But it comes up with "page not found"

Thanks.  All works great.  Appreciate your help