Non-Plusnet e-mails

[#1]

I have just fled the Virgin Media and Talk Talk debacle and joined Plusnet as a residential customer and the service so far has been excellent. Unfortunately, it means informing a multitude of businesses, friends and family that my e-mail address has changed. So to avoid having to do that once again, I want to have an e-mail address that is independant from my ISP but I don't want to go with the likes of Googlemail or Hotmail.
My idea is to buy a domain name (not through Plusnet) and transfer it in to PN, set up e-mail accounts using the domain name, so that I can send and receive e-mail using Thunderbird on my PC with PN acting as host. Is this possible? If it is, what would be the costs involved? And are there any restrictions on using a domain name ending in, say, .net or .xyz?
I have looked at the Domain help pages and found them very confusing and I have also phoned Customer Service but they didn't seem to know much about domains or I didn't ask the right questions - one said I could do it and another said PN doesn't do it any more, which left me even more confused.
Can anyone give me a definitive answer please?

[#2]

http://community.plus.net/forum/index.php/topic,139051.0.html 

[#3]

My advice would be not to use PN for to host your domain for email but look at email only hosting elsewhere.  This is then truly independent of any ISP that you may choose to use for connectivity in the future and, depending on the host chosen, would allow you to move to an account with webspace in the future should you need it.

[#4]

Quote from: janlan

My idea is to buy a domain name (not through Plusnet) and transfer it in to PN, set up e-mail accounts using the domain name, so that I can send and receive e-mail using Thunderbird on my PC with PN acting as host. Is this possible? If it is, what would be the costs involved? And are there any restrictions on using a domain name ending in, say, .net or .xyz?

Whilst it's possible, our residential accounts don't technically support hosting any more, unless you pay for the registration of a .co.uk domain at £1/mnth. Having said that, when you register the domain you're wanting to use, drop me a PM and I'll see if I can sort something out for you. As far as hosting is concerned, the TLD i.e. .net .xyz doesn't matter.

[#5]

Thanks for your quick replies and pwatson's suggestion sounds like a good idea. My son says I could use his website host and that could be one solution - that's as long as he keeps his site running!
Alternatively, I've had a look at a few e-mail only hosts and read some reviews of them but, as usual, every one of them gets slated to some degree and it's difficult to know which are reliable. Has any one had any experience with Zoho, as it seems to be well thought of and it's both free and ad-free? Or any other suggestions?
Then all I've got to do is think of a domain name that hasn't already been taken - easier said than done!
Thanks for your help

[#6]

Quote from: janlan

Alternatively, I've had a look at a few e-mail only hosts and read some reviews of them but, as usual, every one of them gets slated to some degree and it's difficult to know which are reliable. Has any one had any experience with Zoho, as it seems to be well thought of and it's both free and ad-free? Or any other suggestions?

Not Zoho, but I've used Tuffmail, EuMX and a weath of others before. The former was very good but I was put off by the lack of development. The latter was also good but the spam filtering let it down a bit. I use Rollernet for some stuff now and they're excellent but it's pretty technical so you need to know what you're doing. Some might be put off by the location too (based in the US).
If it's just email hosting your after (and not web), then I've always found this to be a fairly decent resource.

Quote from: janlan

I want to have an e-mail address that is independant from my ISP but I don't want to go with the likes of Googlemail or Hotmail.

Bear in mind that GMail does allow paid domain hosting. Microsoft probably have an equivalent too derived from their Office 365 service.