Home Email Server

[#1]

Hi all,
I really need some help and PlusNet don't seem to be able to grasp what I am trying to do or help me at all. Here is the scenario.
- I own several domain names through GoDaddy and I use their hosted Exchange platform on one of the domains so I have a cool email address. The hosted Exchange contract needs to be renewed in November and it's pretty expensive for personal use and I quite fancy running an email server.
- I have a spare Raspberry Pi and found a neat tutorial about setting it up as an Email Server using Citadel. I am trying to set this Raspberry Pi up as an email server for 1 of the other domains I own so I can create an email account, sign up to some newsletters etc and see if the Raspberry Pi is up to the job of running as a permanent email server for when my hosted Exchange contract runs out so I can keep using the cool email address.
I have followed PlusNets instructions for transferring a domain to them as a "hosting only" domain and they have told me they can no longer do this..... I have a static IP address, I've done all necessary port forwarding on the router and I have pointed me A records for the domain to my static IP address through GoDaddy. I don't really know what to do, if I change the nameservers for the domain to the PlusNet ones (force9) I can't control the domain through GoDaddy (other than renewing it) but PlusNet won't transfer it in to my account to manage from there.
I've set up the following records for the domain on the GoDaddy site.
A - domain-name.co.uk - Static IP assigned by PlusNet.
CNAME - imap. & smtp.
MX - mail.domain-name.co.uk
But this is still with the GoDaddy name servers and I cannot connect to my email server. How has anyone else set up a home email server? PlusNet say loads of people host email servers at home and I should ask the community...................
Please help! I've wasted so much time waiting for responses and trying to figure this out.
Thank you to anyone that can help me.

[#2]

Quote from: miraclemerker

I've set up the following records for the domain on the GoDaddy site. A - domain-name.co.uk - Static IP assigned by PlusNet. CNAME - imap. & smtp. MX - mail.domain-name.co.uk

You don't appear to have set up an A record for mail.domain-name.co.uk.
It has to be an A record and not a CNAME, but you can have more than one A record per IP address.

[#3]

Quote from: miraclemerker

I don't really know what to do, if I change the nameservers for the domain to the PlusNet ones (force9) I can't control the domain through GoDaddy (other than renewing it) but PlusNet won't transfer it in to my account to manage from there.

I have no idea how much GoDaddy charge for hosting and renewals but if all you need is a domain control panel and cheap registrar there are plenty of options out there. I use Hexonet for my primary registrar and fasthosts for other domains (I should probably look at that for cheaper registrations / renewals at some point) but I self-host the nameservers (and using Hexonet lets me specify IPv6 nameservers for my primary domain). I'd steer clear of 123-reg as they recently added a policy of charging for transferring domains out.

[#4]

I've got this working with GoDaddy and PN so it is possible and it's pretty much as Avatastic says..
After reading and research, plus using tools like mxtoolbox.com and allaboutspam.com, my DNS setup is:
A records:
@ = PN IP Address
mail = PN IP Addres
MX records:
host @ points to mail.domain.co.uk
TXT record:
v=spf1 a mx mx:mail.domain.co.uk -all
You'll also need to get PN to point your reverse DNS to your domain, that happened in a few hours for me.
Assume you've forward port 25 to your PI ok? Use mxtoolbox.com - that's handy for checking it all and will give you pointers to where it's failing.

[#5]

When you do get it working, look into secondary/backup MX services if you don't want to lose email when your connection is down.

[#6]

Also be aware that on some routers it may not be possible to test the mail server being on the LAN side unless it support loopback http://help.screenconnect.com/Cannot_access_external_IP_address_from_LAN