exchange 2000 configuration problem

[unknown]

We have an ISP that receives all the email for our domain. We later use
POPBeamer to download the email via POP3 and send it to our Exchange 2000
Server via SMTP. Our Exchange server is called mail.ourdomain.com. But it
seems the ISP has set up mail.ourdomain.com in DNS MX record as the name to
send our email to. Inside our LAN, the workstations have no problem to
access our Exchange server to send and receive email. Those people
travelling have more problems because when VPN'd into the server, sometimes
DNS lookup gives them the Exchange server and sometimes it gives them the
ISP, which means they can't connect to the exchange server. Laptops that
have a wired connection to our LAN but a WIFI connection to the Internet
have access to both mail.ourdomain.com's at the same time and that also
causes problems.

I wanted to change our Exchange server name to mailserver.ourdomain.com but
that is not allowed since it is a server or a PDC or some reason. I
definitely do NOT want to reinstall that server from scratch. Is there any
trick to rename the server. Could I ask the ISP to rename the MX record to
something like Email.ourdomain.com without causing any problems on the
outside world?

Another issue is that the ISP sends us most of our email via a catch-all
account. But we do have a few accounts registered at the ISP for those that
travel and their emails should not be sent to our exchange server but rather
downloaded from the ISP directly via POP3. The problem is that users inside
our LAN that try to send emails to the travelers get a bounce message.
Apparently, the Exchange server looks for that user name on the exchange
server itself and can't find it so it rejects the email. It would be nice if
it would be possible to configure those accounts to be sent out to the ISP
rather than bounced. I did try sending all emails that can not be reconciled
on the exchange server out to the ISP but that caused a lot of spam or
mispelled names to be sent back and forth infinitely - I had to switch that
off.

Thanks...

[John Oliver, Jr. [MVP]]

Have you considered just hosting your own SMTP mail using Exchange and
dumping POP3 altogether? Is there some underlying reason you have not
considered this? POP'ing your mail to Exchange then having a third party
tool to distribute the mail is really a last resort in most cases, such as
slow or intermittent broadband connection. This is why I am asking.
--
John Oliver, Jr
MCSE, MCT, CCNA
Exchange MVP 2007
Microsoft Certified Partner

Post by unknown
We have an ISP that receives all the email for our domain. We later use
POPBeamer to download the email via POP3 and send it to our Exchange 2000
Server via SMTP. Our Exchange server is called mail.ourdomain.com. But it
seems the ISP has set up mail.ourdomain.com in DNS MX record as the name
to send our email to. Inside our LAN, the workstations have no problem to
access our Exchange server to send and receive email. Those people
travelling have more problems because when VPN'd into the server,
sometimes DNS lookup gives them the Exchange server and sometimes it gives
them the ISP, which means they can't connect to the exchange server.
Laptops that have a wired connection to our LAN but a WIFI connection to
the Internet have access to both mail.ourdomain.com's at the same time and
that also causes problems.
I wanted to change our Exchange server name to mailserver.ourdomain.com
but that is not allowed since it is a server or a PDC or some reason. I
definitely do NOT want to reinstall that server from scratch. Is there any
trick to rename the server. Could I ask the ISP to rename the MX record to
something like Email.ourdomain.com without causing any problems on the
outside world?
Another issue is that the ISP sends us most of our email via a catch-all
account. But we do have a few accounts registered at the ISP for those
that travel and their emails should not be sent to our exchange server but
rather downloaded from the ISP directly via POP3. The problem is that
users inside our LAN that try to send emails to the travelers get a bounce
message. Apparently, the Exchange server looks for that user name on the
exchange server itself and can't find it so it rejects the email. It would
be nice if it would be possible to configure those accounts to be sent out
to the ISP rather than bounced. I did try sending all emails that can not
be reconciled on the exchange server out to the ISP but that caused a lot
of spam or mispelled names to be sent back and forth infinitely - I had to
switch that off.
Thanks...

[unknown]

Sorry, I was away on a business trip.

Inertia I guess. We started that way when we only had a modem connection.
Now we do have a good one. Last time I checked a couple years back, the ISP
couldn't buffer our mail in the event that our server went down and I didn't
want bounce messages going back to customers.

I guess it's time to reconsider. It would solve everything.

Post by John Oliver, Jr. [MVP]
Have you considered just hosting your own SMTP mail using Exchange and
dumping POP3 altogether? Is there some underlying reason you have not
considered this? POP'ing your mail to Exchange then having a third party
tool to distribute the mail is really a last resort in most cases, such as
slow or intermittent broadband connection. This is why I am asking.
--
John Oliver, Jr
MCSE, MCT, CCNA
Exchange MVP 2007
Microsoft Certified Partner

Post by unknown
We have an ISP that receives all the email for our domain. We later use
POPBeamer to download the email via POP3 and send it to our Exchange 2000
Server via SMTP. Our Exchange server is called mail.ourdomain.com. But it
seems the ISP has set up mail.ourdomain.com in DNS MX record as the name
to send our email to. Inside our LAN, the workstations have no problem to
access our Exchange server to send and receive email. Those people
travelling have more problems because when VPN'd into the server,
sometimes DNS lookup gives them the Exchange server and sometimes it
gives them the ISP, which means they can't connect to the exchange
server. Laptops that have a wired connection to our LAN but a WIFI
connection to the Internet have access to both mail.ourdomain.com's at
the same time and that also causes problems.
I wanted to change our Exchange server name to mailserver.ourdomain.com
but that is not allowed since it is a server or a PDC or some reason. I
definitely do NOT want to reinstall that server from scratch. Is there
any trick to rename the server. Could I ask the ISP to rename the MX
record to something like Email.ourdomain.com without causing any problems
on the outside world?
Another issue is that the ISP sends us most of our email via a catch-all
account. But we do have a few accounts registered at the ISP for those
that travel and their emails should not be sent to our exchange server
but rather downloaded from the ISP directly via POP3. The problem is that
users inside our LAN that try to send emails to the travelers get a
bounce message. Apparently, the Exchange server looks for that user name
on the exchange server itself and can't find it so it rejects the email.
It would be nice if it would be possible to configure those accounts to
be sent out to the ISP rather than bounced. I did try sending all emails
that can not be reconciled on the exchange server out to the ISP but that
caused a lot of spam or mispelled names to be sent back and forth
infinitely - I had to switch that off.
Thanks...

[John Oliver, Jr. [MVP]]

Yes, I would agree to move toward hosting your SMTP. If your ISP does not
offer mail spooling when the connection or your server goes down, then look
at third party such www.spamsoap.com or others that will do this and much
more such as antispam, antivirus, etc. at minimal cost per mailbox.
--
John Oliver, Jr
MCSE, MCT, CCNA
Exchange MVP 2007
Microsoft Certified Partner

Post by unknown
Sorry, I was away on a business trip.
Inertia I guess. We started that way when we only had a modem connection.
Now we do have a good one. Last time I checked a couple years back, the
ISP couldn't buffer our mail in the event that our server went down and I
didn't want bounce messages going back to customers.
I guess it's time to reconsider. It would solve everything.

Post by John Oliver, Jr. [MVP]
Have you considered just hosting your own SMTP mail using Exchange and
dumping POP3 altogether? Is there some underlying reason you have not
considered this? POP'ing your mail to Exchange then having a third party
tool to distribute the mail is really a last resort in most cases, such
as slow or intermittent broadband connection. This is why I am asking.
--
John Oliver, Jr
MCSE, MCT, CCNA
Exchange MVP 2007
Microsoft Certified Partner

Post by unknown
We have an ISP that receives all the email for our domain. We later use
POPBeamer to download the email via POP3 and send it to our Exchange
2000 Server via SMTP. Our Exchange server is called mail.ourdomain.com.
But it seems the ISP has set up mail.ourdomain.com in DNS MX record as
the name to send our email to. Inside our LAN, the workstations have no
problem to access our Exchange server to send and receive email. Those
people travelling have more problems because when VPN'd into the server,
sometimes DNS lookup gives them the Exchange server and sometimes it
gives them the ISP, which means they can't connect to the exchange
server. Laptops that have a wired connection to our LAN but a WIFI
connection to the Internet have access to both mail.ourdomain.com's at
the same time and that also causes problems.
I wanted to change our Exchange server name to mailserver.ourdomain.com
but that is not allowed since it is a server or a PDC or some reason. I
definitely do NOT want to reinstall that server from scratch. Is there
any trick to rename the server. Could I ask the ISP to rename the MX
record to something like Email.ourdomain.com without causing any
problems on the outside world?
Another issue is that the ISP sends us most of our email via a catch-all
account. But we do have a few accounts registered at the ISP for those
that travel and their emails should not be sent to our exchange server
but rather downloaded from the ISP directly via POP3. The problem is
that users inside our LAN that try to send emails to the travelers get a
bounce message. Apparently, the Exchange server looks for that user name
on the exchange server itself and can't find it so it rejects the email.
It would be nice if it would be possible to configure those accounts to
be sent out to the ISP rather than bounced. I did try sending all emails
that can not be reconciled on the exchange server out to the ISP but
that caused a lot of spam or mispelled names to be sent back and forth
infinitely - I had to switch that off.
Thanks...