Configuring MX Records for DuoCircle Email Backup Service

Summary

This article shows you how to update your DNS MX records to activate the DuoCircle Email Backup MX service.

Objective

By the end of this article, you will have updated your domain's MX records to activate email backup and spam filtering.

Introduction

Welcome to DuoCircle. Your account with the email backup solution is created. One step remains: update your DNS MX records.

Prerequisites

  • Access to your domain's DNS settings, at your domain registrar, hosting provider, or ISP.
  • Basic knowledge of DNS records, or help from your provider.

Step-by-Step Instructions

  1. Understand why the MX records change: Your MX records must send your domain's mail through the DuoCircle servers for backup and filtering.
  2. View your current MX records: See this guide on updating MX records. Your current records may look like this:
    MX 1 mail.yourdomain.com.
MX 2 mail2.yourdomain.com.
OR
MX 100 mail.yourdomain.com.
  3. Update your MX records: Change your MX records to this:
    MX 10 mail.yourdomain.com.
MX 20 mx1.mailhop.org.  (or your custom MX record)
MX 30 mx1.mailhop.us.
MX 40 mx1.mailhop.co.
MX 50 mx1.mailhop.co.uk.
    Replace mail.yourdomain.com with the hostname or IP address of your mail server.

    Add all four DuoCircle records. They use four top-level domains held at two different DNS providers. If one DNS provider or one registry fails, senders can still resolve one of the others. See MX Records with Redundant DNS Providers.

    IMPORTANT: Enter the MX priorities (the numbers) exactly as shown. The DuoCircle records must have higher priority numbers than your own mail server's record.

    Note: Incorrect MX records cause mail to bounce or to be lost. If you are unsure, ask your hosting provider.

    Older setups use mx2. or mx3. hostnames. Those records still work, so your mail keeps flowing. Move to the mx1. records above when it is convenient. Only the mx1. names have regional equivalents, so an mx2. setup cannot use single-region filtering.

    Filtering in one region only: The records above send your mail to whichever of our two regions is healthy at the time. If you need your mail filtered only in the United States, or only in the European Union, use the regional records instead. See Geographically Diverse Filtering Zones for the full sets.

  4. Save your changes: Save the configuration in your DNS settings. Changes take up to 48 hours to propagate across the Internet.
  5. Activate DuoCircle email filtering: After the DNS changes propagate, DuoCircle's email spam filters start work. Full filtering is in effect within two days.
  6. Setting a destination server for MX Backup: You usually do NOT need a destination mail server for MX Backup. If you set one, it takes precedence over your primary MX record. See Why does my MX Backup Service have a destination server option?
  7. Optional: restrict delivery to DuoCircle servers (advanced): After the DNS change propagates, you can configure your mail server to accept mail only from DuoCircle servers. This stops "transient spam". The addresses to allow are here: IP Addresses for Firewalls.

Conclusion

Your MX records now route mail through the DuoCircle backup and filtering service. If you have problems or more questions, contact us or email support@duocircle.com.

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