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@rl_dane @AnachronistJohn use a VPN to tunnel from a dirt cheap VPS so you can have their static IP for your mail. Immediately go check the reputation of the IP address because someone probably spammed from it in the past, but you can fix it.

Then you should have a reputable IP that can be used. Otherwise you're probably screwed because residential IPs are nearly impossible to get off the lists.

That's how I'm doing it right now. I have my Fastmail as a backup but I've been migrating nearly all my email usage to self-hosted. The Fastmail is my insurance plan if I get hit by a bus so my wife can keep accessing the really important stuff, do password resets, etc. A bad power outage or crash and she'd be screwed because my homelab stuff is all full disk encrypted...

@feld @rl_dane This is one of my test email servers. It gets a public, static IP over a tinc tunnel. It’s a backup MX for more than a hundred domains and the primary MX for a test domain.

https://poofydoof.zia.io/

I think most people would be surprised at how modest a computer is required to host email.

What requires resources, really, is dealing with the half a dozen IMAP processes running simultaneously, fighting with each other, because multiple devices are configured to fetch constantly.

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@feld @rl_dane I’ve run full mail servers (with SMTP AUTH, but without IMAP / IPOP3) on PogoPlugs, and they have 128 megs of memory. I’ve also run a Mac LC III+ with 36 megs, but TLS negotiation sometimes takes longer than other mail servers are willing to wait (and it can’t do more than one at a time). Memory isn’t usually an issue.