[Nick B]

I used EarthLink for years and have been with Go Daddy for a number of years. I pay for a few email domain names. Last year, they switched their email program to Microsoft 365. Can’t stand it and Go Daddy’s tech support is also really lacking nowadays.

I’m looking for alternatives to Go Daddy. Any other providers with reasonable costs that are reliable? I need 2 email addresses. Have a Google email, but don’t like using it.

[FullRangeMan]

How resonable cost? Dont pay a cent for email, use free email.
Try these:
https://www.gmx.com/consentpage

https://mailfence.com/

https://account.protonmail.com/login

Email-Microsoft

[WGH]

I have 4 emails, instead of logging into 4 different servers I use the free Mozilla Thunderbird. It's perfect for me. Thunderbird has a nice calendar function too.
https://www.thunderbird.net/en-US/

After importing the emails they are deleted off the servers so I never run out of server space. Of course you will need a backup plan because all your emails are now on your personal computer. The free One Drive or Google Drive could be set up to automatically archive emails.

I use GoDaddy as my domain name registrar plus I have MSN and Gmail email accounts, all go into Thunderbird. I never have to go to the web portal to check email,

My business website is hosted by Webby Tech for $5.99/month. There are probably cheaper plans somewhere.
You don't need to set up a website, just use their servers for email. The advantage of a domain name is your email addresses are permanent where ever you move to in the world.

I don't trust free email companies, I remember when the Dot-com bubble burst in early 2000 and internet based companies disappeared overnight.

[Nick B]

Thank you both for the suggestions

[richidoo]

Hi Nick!
I used GoDaddy to host my domain for 10 years. I like car racing and Danica was hot commodity back then and the price was OK, and GoDaddy wasn't yet full blown "GoDaddy" like they are now.

GoDaddy gradually tarnished and I wanted to move off it for years, but it was always easier to just pay it. But when I found out they were ditching simple mail for Microsoft I decided to jump off. They switched me to 360 mail a month earlier than their original notices, so I got to see what it was like before I moved. GoDaddy email is now hosted entirely on Microsoft servers and they don't even hide it, the webmail app domain is microsoft. Google has read and censored my emails, and I regard MS with the same loving feelings as Google. So I was glad I had already made the decision. I had about free 10 email boxes on GoDaddy, with a 100MB TOTAL quota for all mailboxes combined! GoDaddy required each mailbox to start a new account and pay $17/yr.  I would have had to pay $140 to keep the email boxes at GoDaddy. Seems like shooting themselves in the foot, but maybe they know what they're doing. I hope they account for how much their customers like them and how willing they are to move if pushed. I didn't hesitate.  But I am not afraid of doing IT chores when required, I'm just lazy. People who need to find and hire someone to move their hosting for them will be less eager, and less happy with GoDaddy new prices.

Anyway, while hosting it on GoDaddy I kept my main domain registered at Dotster. I almost went with hostgater who also has simple mail and CPanel, but Dotster had even better deal on hosting so I moved my hosting to Dotster and had a good experience. Admin GUI is very easy. 500MB per mailbox for unlimited mailboxes. Then I moved my other parked domains from GoDaddy registration to Dotster registration. And even tho I'm not hosting those other domains, I still have unlimited free email boxes on those with 500MB each, because I have a hosting account with a different domain.

I had a little hiccup with the email server on dotster but the support chat is very good, issues resolved quickly. GoDaddy was $9 month after being there 10 years. Dotster intro ~$3.50/mo, then $5/mo. 

I am so relieved to finally be out of GoDaddy. It wasn't hard to move. It was easy to setup new mailboxes and make the move. HostGater seemed a good choice too, but since I was already at Dotster for 25 years without problem I thought it would be nice to have everything all at one shop. So far so good.

I too use Thunderbird client. It isn't perfect but I have learned to adapt it quirks and I've used it for 20 years.
Rich

[Nick B]

Hi Nick!
I used GoDaddy to host my domain for 10 years. I like car racing and Danica was hot commodity back then and the price was OK, and GoDaddy wasn't yet full blown "GoDaddy" like they are now.

GoDaddy gradually tarnished and I wanted to move off it for years, but it was always easier to just pay it. But when I found out they were ditching simple mail for Microsoft I decided to jump off. They switched me to 360 mail a month earlier than their original notices, so I got to see what it was like before I moved. GoDaddy email is now hosted entirely on Microsoft servers and they don't even hide it, the webmail app domain is microsoft. Google has read and censored my emails, and I regard MS with the same loving feelings as Google. So I was glad I had already made the decision. I had about free 10 email boxes on GoDaddy, with a 100MB TOTAL quota for all mailboxes combined! GoDaddy required each mailbox to start a new account and pay $17/yr.  I would have had to pay $140 to keep the email boxes at GoDaddy. Seems like shooting themselves in the foot, but maybe they know what they're doing. I hope they account for how much their customers like them and how willing they are to move if pushed. I didn't hesitate.  But I am not afraid of doing IT chores when required, I'm just lazy. People who need to find and hire someone to move their hosting for them will be less eager, and less happy with GoDaddy new prices.

Anyway, while hosting it on GoDaddy I kept my main domain registered at Dotster. I almost went with hostgater who also has simple mail and CPanel, but Dotster had even better deal on hosting so I moved my hosting to Dotster and had a good experience. Admin GUI is very easy. 500MB per mailbox for unlimited mailboxes. Then I moved my other parked domains from GoDaddy registration to Dotster registration. And even tho I'm not hosting those other domains, I still have unlimited free email boxes on those with 500MB each, because I have a hosting account with a different domain.

I had a little hiccup with the email server on dotster but the support chat is very good, issues resolved quickly. GoDaddy was $9 month after being there 10 years. Dotster intro ~$3.50/mo, then $5/mo. 

I am so relieved to finally be out of GoDaddy. It wasn't hard to move. It was easy to setup new mailboxes and make the move. HostGater seemed a good choice too, but since I was already at Dotster for 25 years without problem I thought it would be nice to have everything all at one shop. So far so good.

I too use Thunderbird client. It isn't perfect but I have learned to adapt it quirks and I've used it for 20 years.
Rich

Hi Rich,
Good to hear from you! I’ve been dissatisfied with Go Daddy for quite a while, but i’ve put off doing anything because there seems to be so much work involved. That includes migrating all the stored emails over at Go Daddy to whatever new site. Don’t know how to do that. It’s interesting that two of my domain email addresses were hacked, probably through the Target data breach and a huge healthcare system that I’m a member of as well. Maybe I should just give them both up. Fortunately, I have all the info on my iPad as to what email addresses I use for different vendors/offices. I have a friend who’s been using mail.com for years, so maybe I should check that out also.
As I use only Apple products and their Apple mail program works well, I would just continue to use that. If I understand you and WGH correctly, I could use Thunderbird to store the emails?
I would think the Apple iCloud should provide the backup.
Nick

[WGH]

If I understand you and WGH correctly, I could use Thunderbird to store the emails?
I would think the Apple iCloud should provide the backup.

Yes, I have 5.12 GB of emails. Each client has a folder, there are folders for registration emails, insurance, investments, GoDaddy, anything where I might need to find info.

iCloud will work, the hardest part will be finding where Thunderbird stores your data. I always have to use Google to find out.

[richidoo]

Hi Rich,
Good to hear from you! I’ve been dissatisfied with Go Daddy for quite a while, but i’ve put off doing anything because there seems to be so much work involved. That includes migrating all the stored emails over at Go Daddy to whatever new site. Don’t know how to do that. It’s interesting that two of my domain email addresses were hacked, probably through the Target data breach and a huge healthcare system that I’m a member of as well. Maybe I should just give them both up. Fortunately, I have all the info on my iPad as to what email addresses I use for different vendors/offices. I have a friend who’s been using mail.com for years, so maybe I should check that out also.
As I use only Apple products and their Apple mail program works well, I would just continue to use that. If I understand you and WGH correctly, I could use Thunderbird to store the emails?
I would think the Apple iCloud should provide the backup.
Nick

Thunderbird is just an email client software, like outlook, or Apple Mail. It runs on your local computer. Yes you can store emails on any email client, but Thundertird slows down Windows badly when there are too many emails in its active database.  Maybe it is less of a problem with Apple OS. I pare down my thunderbird data each year to keep it smallish. I use MozBackup utility to backup Thundertird, then I delete everything more than one year old. I repeat each year.

It wasn't possible to "bulk export" email out of godaddy as database file when it was simple mail on linux server. You had to forward the emails out individually. But now that GoDaddy is Microsoft, you can supposedly backup mail/contacts/calendar as a pst file.  I don't think simple mail servers can import pst file, but you can research that. You can restore it to another Microsoft 365 host tho.

Good password etiquette should keep you safe from hackers. Make them hard and change it often. Use a password manager like LastPass to make it easy. You can look up email addresses online to see if they are on any hacker lists.
https://haveibeenpwned.com/Passwords
I just looked up 6 old passwords I've used over the decades and 4 of them were pwned. But my current ones were still good. I think this list may not be exhaustive or current, but you can look for better ones.

Cloud is the best way to back up important files long term, but it's wise to have them on a local backup also, imo.

[FullRangeMan]

Having read what GoDaddy and other providers does, I can assure from my experience with Gmail that Google does all this and much more to threaten his custumers.

The IA from Gmail reads and evaluates every word in my emails and send me advertising suggestions based on this.

Also every few months Gmail would deny me access to my email by demanding additional confirmation of my identity in clearly aggressive terms, want sending me code by cell phone, completing the alternate email address, informing day/month/year that account was created, what was the complete name of a half dozens folders in my email account and others as below:
What is your main way of using this account?
( ) Personal
( ) Work
( ) Both
Does anyone else use this account?
( ) No, only I use this account.
( ) Yes, a family member or co-worker also uses this account.

Other thing very odd is why someone would keep save old email msg that can lead to easy tracking your activities on web by email.

[WGH]

Also every few months Gmail would deny me access to my email by demanding additional confirmation of my identity in clearly aggressive terms

That is called two factor authentication and you should be happy they do it. 2FA protects your account from being accessed by an unauthorised third party that may have been able to discover, for example, a single password.

I get authentication text codes all the time from financial institutions, medical web portals and Microsoft, no big deal.

You can let Google know that you find their authentication request clearly aggressive by clicking on the Support question mark to get to the "Send feedback to Google" button.

[Nick B]

Yes, I have 5.12 GB of emails. Each client has a folder, there are folders for registration emails, insurance, investments, GoDaddy, anything where I might need to find info.

iCloud will work, the hardest part will be finding where Thunderbird stores your data. I always have to use Google to find out.

I used the same folder structure and it worked great for a number of years. When Go Daddy migrated from their old platform to Microsoft, the emails in my Apple mail folders disappeared. What a mess… I can still usually find stuff by doing a search

[Nick B]

Thunderbird is just an email client software, like outlook, or Apple Mail. It runs on your local computer. Yes you can store emails on any email client, but Thundertird slows down Windows badly when there are too many emails in its active database.  Maybe it is less of a problem with Apple OS. I pare down my thunderbird data each year to keep it smallish. I use MozBackup utility to backup Thundertird, then I delete everything more than one year old. I repeat each year.

It wasn't possible to "bulk export" email out of godaddy as database file when it was simple mail on linux server. You had to forward the emails out individually. But now that GoDaddy is Microsoft, you can supposedly backup mail/contacts/calendar as a pst file.  I don't think simple mail servers can import pst file, but you can research that. You can restore it to another Microsoft 365 host tho.

Good password etiquette should keep you safe from hackers. Make them hard and change it often. Use a password manager like LastPass to make it easy. You can look up email addresses online to see if they are on any hacker lists.
https://haveibeenpwned.com/Passwords
I just looked up 6 old passwords I've used over the decades and 4 of them were pwned. But my current ones were still good. I think this list may not be exhaustive or current, but you can look for better ones.

Cloud is the best way to back up important files long term, but it's wise to have them on a local backup also, imo.

Ok, I understand about Thunderbird. For starters, I should get into Go Daddy and get rid of emails I no longer want or need. There are quite a few… I looked up a couple of my passwords on the website you linked and 2 were known. I use RoboForm as a password manager and it works pretty well, is Mac compatible and saves websites that don’t require a password.