[quote user="CobraA1"]

Thanks. I now have a direct to my PC email with a fall back to my domain name provider.

I do have a question, though: When sending email, is it possible to set it up so that it is direct, but falls back to a relay if direct doesn't work?
 

[/quote]

No but if you run your own DNS system you can set the IP address for the AOL (or any other host that blocks your connection) MX host to your relay hosts IP address so MercuryE will deliver the AOL mail to the relay host.

So, I've just bought a new domain name recently, and I was setting it up for email usage - and I thought to myself "wouldn't it be nice to send email directly instead of relaying through a relay server?"

So I set up Mercury to do just that. I set up Mercury to send email directly, and I used no-ip.com to provide me with a name for my IP address at home - which I then put into my SPF record (I have complete DNS control). Right away, I started getting bounces from a friend that used AOL.

So, I researched the problem, and after some digging found that AOL blocks all dynamic IP addresses.

So keep in mind when setting up Mercury, it must be on a static IP address or sent through a relay with a static IP - otherwise, many ISPs will block it.

In any case, I'm a bit more worried about my incoming email than outgoing anyways, since the provider of my domain name provides extremely limited space on their servers for email. I understand that you can have several MX entries, allowing a fall back if the primary server goes down. I've heard, however, that not all mail servers will fall back to the backup entries. Is this a big problem that I have to worry about?

[quote user="CobraA1"]

In any case, I'm a bit more worried about my incoming email than outgoing anyways, since the provider of my domain name provides extremely limited space on their servers for email. I understand that you can have several MX entries, allowing a fall back if the primary server goes down. I've heard, however, that not all mail servers will fall back to the backup entries. Is this a big problem that I have to worry about?

[/quote]

Not really, all SMTP hosts will re-try later if they can't connect to the host and FWIW, I've never seen anything but spammer systems not try the higher  MX hosts.  You may be thinkiing about the broken servers that take a 400 series temporary error as a 500 series fatal error and do not retry.

Thanks. I now have a direct to my PC email with a fall back to my domain name provider.

I do have a question, though: When sending email, is it possible to set it up so that it is direct, but falls back to a relay if direct doesn't work?