How can I fix my domain email and DNS setup?
Asked by
MellowCedar42
I'm new to managing DNS and currently have several websites and email accounts hosted through IONOS. One domain's DNS records had to be wiped after an iCloud-related problem, and I had to recreate TXT records for Formspree, which was difficult. I'm now trying to understand a few things: Is Thunderbird a good email client, and why do messages seem to appear in Gmail or Outlook before Thunderbird? Is IONOS reliable for hosting and business email, or would providers such as Google or Microsoft be better, especially since messages sent to customers often land in spam? Is a roughly 70 KB email signature unnecessarily large? Finally, why does one domain email require manual configuration even though an automatic configuration record is set up?
Answers
A 70 KB signature is quite large. It probably isn’t the main reason mail is classified as spam, but large embedded images can be stripped, display poorly, or slow down messages. Keep the signature mostly text with a small optimized logo or no image at all. If you eventually migrate providers, do it only after documenting the current DNS records and making a complete list of every service that sends mail for the domain.
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Before changing hosts, check the domain’s MX, SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records. Thunderbird won’t affect whether messages go to spam. Since the DNS was recently rebuilt and Formspree sends mail for the domain, SPF may need to include every legitimate sending service. Send a test message to Gmail and use “Show original” to see whether SPF, DKIM, and DMARC pass. A shared hosting provider can have reputation issues, but authentication problems are often the real cause.
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Thunderbird is perfectly fine as an email client, but it doesn’t control delivery or spam filtering. With IMAP, it syncs messages that have already reached the mail server. Gmail and Outlook may simply show push notifications faster than Thunderbird checks for new mail. The manual setup prompt usually means the autodiscover or autoconfig record is missing, incorrect, cached incorrectly, or the client needs the exact IMAP and SMTP settings supplied by the email host.
QuietMaple18: I’ve also had account creation fail even after entering the settings manually, so I’d verify the server names, ports, encryption method, and username format rather than relying only on the automatic setup.
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BriskWillow5: Moving to Google or Microsoft may provide stronger email administration and reputation, but it won’t automatically fix delivery. The DNS authentication records still need to be configured correctly after the move.