
Microsoft ends support for custom domains in free email service - sgy
http://www.zdnet.com/microsoft-ends-support-for-custom-domains-in-free-email-service-7000028306/?s_cid=e589&ttag=e589&ftag=TREc64629f
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cordite
I currently use outlook's services on my own personal domain, a simple
me@myname.com

I have no business aspirations here with my one account. Google apps would
have been my first choice, but now that it is not free and I'm a mere college
student, I looked elsewhere.

Does anybody have solutions for those like me that only desire 1 or two emails
for an entire personal domain?

~~~
funkyy
It seems that this is great opportunity for email hosting startup right here.
A lot of people in your situation now.

~~~
cordite
I'd be willing to pay a dollar a month for a daily email flow of like 1-10 Max
a day in, 2 out.

Well, Max being "regular maximum I've goo ten so far" hot a hard limit.

But also why I choose Microsoft or Google would be because of decent spam
detection and overall filtering,

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gberger
pobox.com is $20 per year, which is $1.67 per month

~~~
cordite
It seems appealing except the lack of IMAP and/or POP access.

How am I to see email notifications on my phone or through a simple email
client on my desktop?

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kijin
The Outlook.com UI is great, but last time I checked, the signup and
management interface for free custom domains was as clunky and unnavigable as
it could possibly be.

It was still on the old Live.com UI, with no links to/from any other part of
Outlook.com. The features were poorly documented, it was too easy to mess up
something and lose data, and worst of all, Microsoft refused to activate my
domain unless its randomly generated MX record was added to the DNS _with the
lowest priority_. That left no room for a period of testing and graceful
migration from the previous email host. Moreover, it would deactivate the
domain as soon as it detected another MX record with a lower priority, so it
was impossible to gracefully migrate away from Microsoft, either.

I hope the paid option (Office 365) has a better management interface.

~~~
edandersen
For Office 365 you actually have to change your nameservers over to Microsoft
and they handle your DNS. The plus side of this is that Exchange Autoconfigure
works, but the downside is that you have to use their UI for custom DNS
records.

~~~
tanzam75
> _For Office 365 you actually have to change your nameservers over to
> Microsoft and they handle your DNS._

No, you don't. That is just an option. The other option is to use a third-
party nameserver.

See: [http://technet.microsoft.com/en-
us/library/office-365-domain...](http://technet.microsoft.com/en-
us/library/office-365-domains.aspx)

~~~
edandersen
Thanks for the correction! Unfortunately I cannot edit my incorrect statement
now. Upvoting so people can see the correction.

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ljoshua
I'd love (and would pay for) a hosted email service that charged in some
fashion other than per user or per domain. I've got various low volume
addresses on various domains that I'd love to consolidate under one roof, and
MS's custom domains was the closest thing to that. What keeps me from
migrating to so many of these other services is the flat $x/address structure.
That gets pricey fast if you have two or three per domain, and three, four, or
more domains.

Other tacts might be charging by space consumed, messages sent, or a flat fee
for a bucket with resource limits. Anyone know any providers offering models
like that?

~~~
nmjenkins
You can host up to 50 domains (with up to 500 addresses) for $40/year with a
FastMail Enhanced account (all delivered to the same mailbox).

~~~
kijin
+1 for FastMail.

People should seriously realize that Google, Yahoo, and MS are not the only
webmail services left in the world. There are lots of small to medium-sized,
independent businesses that offer excellent email service with lots of cool
features. The only reason they're not world-famous is because they don't hand
out free accounts like candy, but that's also exactly why they can afford to
treat you as a real customer (not a product).

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wzy
I just created 4 account on Tuesday and as i was creating them, i was thinking
to myself "I bet MS will soon start charging for this..." How did i know...?
Because their support system sucks, if you go on their support forum you will
easily see 6 months old tickets without a single response. I still have one
untouched for about 5 weeks. Now that you will have to pay, hopefully they
will start giving a shti about support

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jakebasile
I don't mind paying for the service. I just hope they handle migration to
Office 365 well. I currently sign in to my Windows Phone with an account made
through this, and it automatically sets up contacts/calendar/email sync. What
I don't want to happen when I move to Office 365 (which seems to use a
different "Organizational" account system) is to have two email accounts for
the same email address, when only the Office 365 (Exchange) one works.

Edit: same goes for Windows 8(.1) as to automatic accounts. Deleting and
recreating would be an option (I don't keep emails around for long), except
this Microsoft account also has all my Xbox games and a few licenses of
Windows attached to it.

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tracker1
This is relatively upsetting... I really liked the service, and had been
planning on moving a couple domains of mine to them so I could shut down my
mail server.

Really not worth over $5/month per account to maintain a half dozen custom
email addresses. And a few for friends/family.

Also, not fond of running my own mail server any longer. Any suggestions for a
hosting service that supports accounts with multiple domains that doesn't cost
an arm and a leg... if I could get ~5 domains and ~15 email addresses in them
for < $20/month I'd be up for it... similar features to
outlook.com/ymail/gmail, spam filters etc would be top priority.

~~~
danieldk
_Really not worth over $5 /month per account to maintain a half dozen custom
email addresses. And a few for friends/family._

Moreover, it misses a few features that outlook.com has, like subadressing.

Better use Fastmail, which has a ton of features. Is actually fast (I tried
Exchange Online, it was _slow_ ). And if you take a family account, you can
make accounts for family relatively cheaply.

Of course, if you use calendars and ActiveSync, Exchange is currently the
better option.

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kf5jak
Glad I got in when I had the chance! I use to use googles service, but tend to
like outlook just a bit more. Not that I favor microsoft, just like the
interface and features more.

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ellysetaylor21
I left Google apps when they started to charge and started the free custom
live outlook , Now that Microsoft was unable to find a way to be innovative
and different from Google, and find a way to profit off of their free email
service, I will be going back to Google Apps and signing up for their paid
product.

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prattbhatt
Turns out Yahoo offers a business mail plan to Indian users which provides
1000 email accounts (!) for ~ $5 / month

Link: [https://in.business.yahoo.com/business-
email/features/](https://in.business.yahoo.com/business-email/features/)

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gggggggg
From admin.live.com, here is the kicker:

"We will continue to support the ability to log in to Outlook.com with your
existing custom domain email address, but you will no longer be able to add or
remove accounts in your domain."

No changes at all. That is not fun.

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tn13
I have been using Zoho.

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funkyy
Wow, this is unexpected. Microsoft is trying to redesign itself and now it is
doing this? Google have much more public approval and trust than Microsoft.
Why anyone would prefer to pay Microsoft to be its main email hosting rather
than pay the same money for amazing Gmail features? I am using Live.com at the
moment for my own domain, but the news will probably make me to move to Gmail.
Live is really nice service but if priced the same as Google - Gmail is in the
lead. To be honest I would prefer to see untargeted ad in main inbox field
(thus no tracking) rather than pay... What happened to basic FREE features on
the web? If free business email was possible in 2000s, why now in era of cheap
hosting is becoming extinct?

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joshuacc
I don't know if you've tried using outlook.com lately, but it is refreshingly
simple compared to how complicated the Gmail interface has become.

~~~
ChrisGaudreau
I just tried Outlook for the first time in a while, and I am pretty surprised.
It's quite good.

