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Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

Synology DiskStation
Mail Station 2 Users Guide

2011-1-14

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

United States and other countries. Marvell is registered trademarks of Marvell Semiconductor, Inc. or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. Freescale is registered trademarks of Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. Other products and company names mentioned herein are trademarks of their respective holders. Even though Synology has reviewed this document, SYNOLOGY MAKES NO WARRANTY OR REPRESENTATION, EITHER EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, WITH RESPECT TO THIS DOCUMENT, ITS QUALITY, ACCURACY, MERCHANTABILITY, OR FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. AS A RESULT, THIS DOCUMENT IS PROVIDED AS IS, AND YOU, THE READER, ARE ASSUMING THE ENTIRE RISK AS TO ITS QUALITY AND ACCURACY. IN NO EVENT WILL SYNOLOGY BE LIABLE FOR DIRECT, INDIRECT, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES RESULTING FROM ANY DEFECT OR INACCURACY IN THIS DOCUMENT, even if advised of the possibility of such damages. THE WARRANTY AND REMEDIES SET FORTH ABOVE ARE EXCLUSIVE AND IN LIEU OF ALL OTHERS, ORAL OR WRITTEN, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED. No Synology dealer, agent, or employee is authorized to make any

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Synology Inc. 2011 Synology Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, mechanical, electronic, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission of Synology Inc., with the following exceptions: Any person is hereby authorized to store documentation on a single computer for personal use only and to print copies of documentation for personal use provided that the documentation contains Synologys copyright notice. The Synology logo is a trademark of Synology Inc. No licenses, express or implied, are granted with respect to any of the technology described in this document. Synology retains all intellectual property rights associated with the technology described in this document. This document is intended to assist application developers to develop applications only for Synology-labeled computers. Every effort has been made to ensure that the information in this document is accurate. Synology is not responsible for typographical errors. Synology Inc. 6F-2, No. 106, Chang-An W. Rd. Taipei 103, Taiwan Synology and the Synology logo are trademarks of Synology Inc., registered in the

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

Table of Content
Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 4 How Email works ....................................................................................................................... 4 Mail User Agent (MUA) ....................................................................................................... 5 Mail Transfer Agent (MTA) .................................................................................................. 5 Mail Delivery Agent (MDA) ................................................................................................. 5 Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) ............................................................................... 5 Before Using Mail Station .......................................................................................................... 6 Connect Synology DiskStation to the Internet.................................................................... 6 DNS Setup.......................................................................................................................... 6 Reverse DNS Setup ........................................................................................................... 9 Install Mail Station.................................................................................................................... 10 Enable User Home ........................................................................................................... 10 Start Mail Station Service ................................................................................................. 10 Mail Station Setting ........................................................................................................... 11 Webmail............................................................................................................................ 12 Mail Station Testing.................................................................................................................. 19 Send Emails to Synology DiskStation .............................................................................. 20 Send Email to Other Email Server ................................................................................... 20 Send Email to DiskStation ................................................................................................ 21 Troubleshooting ....................................................................................................................... 22 Why cant I send or receive emails via webmail from Mail Station? ................................ 22 Why cant I send or receive emails via my email clients? ................................................ 22 Why cant I receive emails sent from another email server (e.g. Gmail).......................... 23 Why do I get rejected emails when I send it to some sites, like Gmail or Hotmail? ......... 23 Document Revision History ..................................................................................................... 24

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

Introduction
This package is an upgraded version of Mail Station and applies only to Synology DiskStation with DSM 3.1 and onward. With Mail Station 2, users can access emails stored on Synology DiskStation by webmail interface. This document is to guide you through the installation of Mail Station 2 and to provide troubleshooting. However, if you still have technical problems, please visit Synology Inc. for support.

How Email works


Whenever you send an email, your mail user agent (MUA) interacts with the mail transfer agents (MTA) in order to get the mail to the right destination.

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

Mail User Agent (MUA)


A mail user agent, or MUA, is an application (e.g. Outlook Express) that runs directly by a user. Mail user agents are used to compose and send out-going messages as well as to display, file and print messages arrived in a user's mailbox.

Mail Transfer Agent (MTA)


Mail transfer agents, or MTA, are used to pass email between different mail servers. When a mail user agent gives a message to a mail transfer agent, the later will pass the message to another transfer agent, or possibly many other transfer agents. Transfer agents are responsible for properly routing messages to the destination.

Mail Delivery Agent (MDA)


Mail delivery agents, or MDA, are used to place a message into a local user's mailbox. When the message arrives at its destination, the final transfer agent will give the message to the appropriate delivery agent, and the later will deliver the message to the user's mailbox.

Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP)


Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) is an Internet standard for email transmission over Internet Protocol (IP) networks. While mail transfer agents use SMTP to send and receive mail messages, mail user agents use only SMTP for sending messages to a mail server for relay.

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

Before Using Mail Station


You have to complete the following preparations before experiencing Synology Mail Station.

Connect Synology DiskStation to the Internet


This section will show you how to use your DiskStation to deliver or receive emails. You can connect your DiskStation to the Internet by 3 ways: direct connection, PPPoE connection, or connection though a router. For details about the connection setup, please refer to our Tutorial on http://www.synology.com. Please note that it is very important for a mail server to have a static IP address. Though it is possible to run a mail server with a dynamic IP address, it is not as reliable as a server with a static IP. We recommend applying a static IP address for your mail server. To have a static IP address when connecting to the Internet, please contact with your Internet service provider. Direct / PPPoE Connection If your DiskStation is connected to Internet by PPPoE, you can enable PPPoE to have your DiskStation connected to the Internet without a router. However, for better security, it is recommended that you enable the firewall in your DiskStation and only open the necessary ports to the Internet. Always disable the firewall before testing the Mail Station, so you can make sure the email delivery problem is not caused by improper firewall configuration. Connection Through a Router If your DiskStation is seated behind a router (or a NAT firewall), you will need to set up port forwarding and open the ports of email service to DiskStation. The following ports are required: Protocol SMTP POP3 IMAP IMAPS POP3S

Port

25

110

143

993

995

IMAPS: IMAP over SSL/TLS Notes POP3S: POP3 over SSL/TLS

Here is a good reference regarding to port forwarding setup of different routers: http://portforward.com.

DNS Setup
A valid domain name is required for people from the Internet to deliver emails to your mail server. To setup the DNS of a mail server, you need to set MX record or/and A record on the DNS server. We will explain the details below. MX record, or Mail Exchanger record, is a type of resource record in the Domain Name System (DNS). It specifies how Internet email should be routed using the Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP). Each MX record contains a host name and a preference. A host name guides emails to arrive at the right destination. A preference points out the relative priority of various servers. For example, to have an email address alex@example.com works, you have to set up the MX record of the domain example.com. To do so, you need to point the MX record to the IP or domain name of your DiskStation.
2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

Using existing DNS If you already have registered a domain name, you can apply its settings. For example, if your email address is alex@example.com, you should set up the A record or MX record and point example.com to the IP of your DiskStation. Just make sure the MX point to a valid domain or IP, so that the emails of example.com can be delivered to DiskStation. How to use DDNS If you do not own a registered domain name, you can set up a free dynamic DNS. But we recommend you to have a static IP address with DDNS to ensure that your email delivery is more reliable. There are many DDNS suppliers, such as DynDNS (http://www.dyndns.com/), TwoDNS (http://www.two-dns.de/), and No-IP (http://www.no-ip.com/). You can create a new account and register a new hostname with them by EZ-Internet (for DSM 3.0 and onward). The wizard will guide you through all the settings.

Or you can also follow the steps below: 1 Go to No-IPs website and log in by existent account or click Create Account.

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

2 After logging in, click Add a Host to create a new host or click Manage Host to modify the host.

3 Fill in the required fields. The IP address shown here is your current IP address. You could also replace it with the IP address of your Synology products. Fill in the MX Record field with the hostname such as synology.no-ip.info.

4 Click Create Host to complete the application. 5 Log in to the DiskStation by admin account. Go to Main Menu > Control Panel > DDNS to enable DDNS support. Choose any service provider as you wish. Then fill in the hostname, account and password. Click OK to apply the settings.
2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

6 Few minutes later, you can log in to your DiskStation with DDNS.

Reverse DNS Setup


The process of assigning specific DNS records to a domain name is known as Forward DNS. This is what leads the domain name to the exact server. However, there is also a reverse process, known as Reverse DNS. If you cant set up Reverse DNS by yourself and keep on experiencing email delivery problem, please create a SMTP server for normal email delivery. To do so, please refer to the SMTP Setup section below. What is Reverse DNS? The Reverse DNS process is the behavior of Domain Name System (DNS). Its main function is to translate the numeric addresses of websites the IP to domain/host names, as opposed to the Forward DNS process. The Reverse DNS refers also to locating which domain name/host belongs to a given IP address, which is why this process is often referred to as Reverse DNS lookup. When a domain name has a valid Reverse DNS, it can also be accessed by just using the IP address. What does the Reverse DNS serve for? Why would you need a Reverse DNS set up for your mail server? The Reverse DNS is one of the basic requirements for running a mail server. Also, it is often used as a spam filter to determine whether the IP address of the incoming message matches an authenticated domain name, and to block the message if it doesn't. You will notice your emails coming back as non deliverable if you do not setup Reverse DNS. How to set up Reverse DNS Setup Reverse DNS on your own host Some ISPs may delegate a portion of the zone to you so that you can host your own reverse DNS. You can configure Reverse DNS by determining PTR records in a DNS server. PTR records are managed by the entity that controls the IP address assigned to you. It may be either your host. It can be yourself if the host has delegated to you the Reverse DNS for your IP space (containing one or multiple IP addresses). A PTR record usually represents the IP entered backwards, followed by an in-addr.arpa entry.

Setup Reverse DNS with your ISP provider The ISP or entity that owns your IP address is the only one who can add the appropriate PTR records.

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

Install Mail Station


Once you complete the setting above, you can install the Mail Station.

Enable User Home


Go to Main Menu > Control Panel > User page. Click User Home to enable this service. The mail sent to or delivered by users will be stored at their Home folder.

Start Mail Station Service


1 Download the package of MailStation.spk from Synology Download Center. After the download is finished, unzip the file for installation. 2 Go to Main Menu > Package Management page and click Install to install the package.

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

3 Once the installation is finished, click Run to enable the service.

Mail Server Setting


1 Once the Mail Station is enabled, you can find the icon of that on Control Panel. Click the icon to start the service.

2 Please fill in the Doman name of your email address. For example, if your email address is alex@example.com, fill example.com here. Basically, it is the domain name after @ of your email address.

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

3 Enable SMTP. If "SMTP Authorization is required" is enabled, you must provide your Synology DiskStation's user account and password for authentication when setting up SMTP server in other mail clients.

Take Outlook Express for example, you can enable the option "My server requires authentication" in [Tools] > [Accounts] > [Mail Account] > [Properties] > [Servers]. This option is recommended to be enabled to avoid being a Spammer. 4 To receive emails on DiskStation, you must enable at least one of the following protocols: POP3, POP3 SSL/TLS, IMAP and IMAP SSL/TLS. You can enable multiple protocols. If you need to set up NAT port forwarding, the protocol you choose should be based on the NAT port settings. If you want to use Webmail, IMAP have to be enabled.

5 Click OK once complete the setting. Now you can receive and deliver emails by Mail Station.

Webmail
The upgraded Mail Station 2 allows you not only to use webmail, but also to create multiple accounts with different POP3 and SMTP settings. It provides centralized management of various emails accounts. If you dont want to create new accounts in the webmail, the default email account of Mail Station 2 will be admin@xxx.xxx. xxx.xxx will be the DNS youve set up previously for your DiskStation. Please note that the webmail on Synology DiskStation does not support non-English account or empty password.
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Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

Read an email 1 When logging in the webmail, you can see the inbox. The window below is the preview pane showing the content of mails you choose. Or you can double click the mail to read it in a larger window.

2 If you want to disable the preview function, click Personal Settings and disable the Show Preview Pane.

Write an email 1 Click the icon to start editing a new email and the email-editing window will pop up.

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Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

After finishing editing, fill in the information of receiver, then click Send Now to send the email. Or you can click Save this draft.

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Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

2 You can attach files to your email. The maximum size of the attachment is 5MB.

3 You can also write email in HTML format.

Access emails from other servers With Mail Station 2, users can receive emails from other servers by their DiskStation. Below we will show how to configure the related settings. 1 In Settings page, go to POP3 tab. Click on the plus icon on lower-left corner to create a new POP3 account. Fill in the necessary fields with your POP3 mail information and click Next to continue.

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

2 Set up options of receiving POP3 mails. Here you can choose the folder to receive the mails of this account. You can also choose to remove the original messages from your POP3 server after the mails are received. Click Next to continue.

3 In this step, you can choose a SMTP server for this POP3 account. You can either choose from the existent SMTP servers or add a new SMTP server here. By adding various SMTP servers, users can choose to send emails from different accounts to protect their privacy. Click Next to continue.

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

4 Set the options for first time receiving the mails from the new account, then click Save to finish the settings.

5 If you want to modify the SMTP server youve set up during the account creation process, you can go to Settings > Preference. In the column on the left side, you will see SMTP Settings. Click on it and you will see your SMTP server settings on the right side. Here you can modify the settings of SMTP servers.

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

6 You can also add a new SMTP server. To do so, click on the drop-down list of Select SMTP server field and you will see Add a SMTP server. You can fill in the necessary information to create a new SMTP server. After when sending an email, you can choose different sender from the SMTP servers youve set up here.

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

Mail Station Testing


We have completed setting up Mail station. Now we are going to do some testing to make sure the mail server works.

The above picture shows how emails are delivered. Here we are dividing the process into various steps. Our test is to make sure that every step works. If any of the steps below fails, please refer to the Troubleshooting section to solve the problem.

Send a email from DiskStation to DiskStation itself and make sure the mail server works Send a email from a PC to a user of the DiskStation to make sure that the MUA can communicate with MTA Send an email TO another email server to make sure DiskStation can deliver the email over the Internet. Send an email FROM another email server to make sure DiskStation can receive email over the Internet.

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

Send Emails to Synology DiskStation


Notification Setting Fill in the SMTP server with your DiskStations server name. Then check Authentication required and fill in username, password and email address such as admin@synology.no-ip.info to exam if the Mail Station functions well. Then, click Send a test email button.

Webmail Please refer to Webmail section to operate the mail testing. If you do not receive the testing mail, please refer to Troubleshooting, section 1. Email Software You can use Outlook Express, Thunderbird or any other email software to receive and deliver the DiskStations mails by filling in necessary information such as account and password. If you can not receive emails, please refer to Troubleshooting, section 2. Then, send a testing email to your account. If you cannot receive or deliver the testing email please refer to Troubleshooting, section 2.

Send Email to Other Email Server


Webmail Refer to Troubleshooting, section 1 and send a testing email to other email accounts such as Gmail. If you cannot receive the testing mail please refer to Troubleshooting, section 1. Email Software You can use Outlook Express, Thunderbird and other email software to receive or deliver the DiskStations mails by filling necessary information such as account and password. If you can receive emails, please refer to Troubleshooting, section 2. Then use the email software to send a testing mail to other email accounts such as Gmail. If you cannot receive the testing mail please refer to Troubleshooting, section 2.

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Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

Send Email to DiskStation


You can send emails to your DiskStation account by other email servers such as Gmail. If you cannot receive the mails please refer to Troubleshooting, section 3.

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

Troubleshooting
Why cant I send or receive emails via webmail from Mail Station?
1 Check if the settings on your Mail Station such as SMTP, DNS, and MX are correct. 2 Check if the Internet settings of your Synology DiskStation are correct. Go to Main Menu > Control Panel > Regional Options page. In Time tab, tick Synchronize with a NTP server and click on Update Now button to exam if the Internet settings are correct. If the result comes back successfully, the settings are correct.

3 Check if the port number on your router is correct. 4 Please visit http://www.spamhaus.org/sbl/ to check if your IP is listed as spammer. If so, remove your IP from blocklist on the same website.

Why cant I send or receive emails via my email clients?


1 Check if you have enabled protocols for IMAP and POP3. 2 Check if your username and password are correct. 3 Check if the settings on your Mail Station such as SMTP, DNS, and MX are correct. 4 Check if the Internet settings of your Synology DiskStation are correct. Go to Main Menu > Control Panel > Regional Options page. In Time tab, tick Synchronize with a NTP server and click on Update Now button to exam if the Internet settings are correct. If the result comes back successfully, the settings are correct. 5 Check if the port number on your router is correct. 6 Check if your IP is listed as spammer. Go to http://www.spamhaus.org/sbl/ to check out. If so, remove your IP from block list on the same website.

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

Why cant I receive emails sent from another email server (e.g. Gmail)
1 Make sure the DNS is correctly configured. You will need to point the MX and A record to DiskStation. So other email servers can find the DiskStation. 2 Make sure DiskStation has a static IP address and is connected to the Internet, or your domain name points correctly to your dynamic IP. 3 If the DiskStation is sit behind the NAT firewall/router, please make sure the port forwarding works. You can check whether the port forwarding works by going to the http://canyouseeme.org/ and inputting the port 25. 4 Check message in the returned mail if any. So you can find the detailed reason of the error.

Why do I get rejected when I send emails to certain webmail accounts, like those of Gmail or Hotmail?
Many free email providers do a reverse DNS lookup to check the validity of the sender. If your reverse DNS lookup doesnt correspond to the sending domain name, you emails will be rejected. Please check with your ISP provider. Another possibility is that your IP address is listed in the SPAM block list. You can check this by visiting http://www.spamhaus.org/sbl/.

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Synology DiskStation Mail Station 2 Users Guide

Document Revision History


This table describes the changes to the Synology DiskStation Mail Station Users Guide. Date Note

Official release of Synology DiskStation Mail Station Users


2009-1-16

Guide

2009-3-16

Revision of Synology DiskStation Mail Station Users Guide

2009-11-05

Revision of Synology DiskStation Mail Station Users Guide

2010-11-08

Revision of Synology DiskStation Mail Station Users Guide

2011-1-13

Revision of Synology DiskStation Mail Station Users Guide

2011-1-13 | 2011 Synology Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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