Exchange Domain Types
When configuring a domain for Hosted Exchange, you must choose an Exchange Domain type for the domain. There are two options:
- Exchange Only Domain: all mail is delivered to the exchange server
- Split Domain: mail delivery is split between the Exchange server and a 3rd party program like SmarterMail
Split Domain is useful if you do not want all your email users configured for Exchange. With Split Domain, you can configure a limited number of users with Exchange mailboxes and the remaining users will be configured with SmarterMail, or another 3rd party mail client.
When attempting to create the initial Exchange mailbox, you will select the Domain Type and click Apply.
The Hosted Exchange and SharePoint web portal will attempt to determine if DNS for your domain name is hosted by HostMySite.com. If it is, the portal will give you the option to automatically update MX record of your domain name to point to the Hosted Exchange server. If you select No, you will need to update the DNS records manually when you are ready to start receiving email to your Exchange Mailbox.
NOTE: Regardless of how your mail is setup, Exchange Only or Split Domain, the DNS records of your domain name will need to be updated to point to the Hosted Exchange server, gateway.myexchangeemail.com.
When configured for Split Domain, all emails sent to the domain are processed as follows:
- Email is sent to the user as normal.
- The email is received by the Hosted Exchange gateway server.
- The gateway server sees that domain configured as Split Domain and determines where the email should be delivered:
- if the recipient has an Exchange mailbox, the email is delivered to the Hosted Exchange server
- if the recipient does not have an Exchange mailbox, the email is delivered to the SmarterMail server
