MX records change

El_Watcher · 2 Nov 2007 at 12:53

I hope someone can give me some help on this.
We used to have our company domain registered with VerizonBusiness, our website hosted with Pipex, and our Exchange email through BT (now Cobweb).
We have now rebuilt our website and decided to move the domain and website on to one host (in this case Fasthosts). All went fine until our email stopped working because the MX records now point to Fasthosts MX server, not Cobwebs.
I have asked Fasthosts how to change the MX record, but they use an IP address, not the full name MX record.
What can I do to create an IP to use with Fasthosts that will point to the Cobweb server (cluster3.eu.messagelabs.com)?
Fasthosts suggest using ZoneEdit.com, but they force you to change nameservers, but would that not change the website address?

voodooflux · 2 Nov 2007 at 13:39

Strictly speaking an MX record *should* be a hostname rather than an IP address (I've recently encountered an issue of non-devilerable email for this very reason).

I can't recall the Fasthosts DNS control panel (as I moved all my domains away from them after the recent security breach debarcle) but if they do require an IP address then the Cobweb server resolves to the following:

Code:

Name:    cluster3.eu.messagelabs.com
Addresses:  85.158.137.35, 85.158.137.67, 85.158.137.83, 85.158.137.99
          85.158.137.131, 85.158.137.147, 85.158.138.35, 85.158.138.67, 85.158.138.83
          85.158.138.99, 85.158.139.51, 85.158.139.67, 194.106.220.35, 194.106.220.51
          194.106.220.67, 85.158.136.3, 85.158.136.35, 85.158.136.115, 85.158.136.211

These should not be relied upon as a long term solution though, and my suggestion would be to move your domain to a more flexible registrar such as 123-Reg.

El_Watcher · 2 Nov 2007 at 14:25

OK thanks, I have set up one of those addresses already, but as you say, it is not a long term solution.
I don't want to move host again so quickly.
Does anyone know how to use ZoneEdit.com?

voodooflux · 2 Nov 2007 at 14:32

I have used ZoneEdit in the past, but I find that 123-reg and/or GoDaddy provide all I need these days.

To use ZoneEdit basically just sign-up for a free account, then you'll be assigned some nameservers which you (or Fasthosts) will need to configure against your domain.

You might have already seen this, but this is the ZoneEdit FAQ.

El_Watcher · 2 Nov 2007 at 14:38

Does changing the nameservers to the ones assigned by Zoneedit, affect the hosting of the website by Fasthosts?

voodooflux · 2 Nov 2007 at 14:43

No, you can configure the www record to continue pointing at your Fasthosts site. You'll need to ask Fasthosts what to "point it at" though (hope that makes sense).