Resolved rDNS problem

[LouisJ]

Foremost, I am new to Plesk. I am using Plesk to manage the DNS settings and struggling with the email deliverability.

I'm using a third party mail service provider and verified that the required MX records are correctly set up. However, there is this ERROR: No reverse DNS entries. The rDNS for the Plesk server is correct. I have individual domains(websites) resolving to the same IP with no issues. However, the pointer record for the external mail service is not.

I checked with the mail service provider and they said it has to be set up on my server. I looked through Plesk and see that there is an option to set up PTR record and I tried with both the mail service provider's IP and my server IP, none works. After some search, it seems there is a need to create a DNS zone via the panel but there is no option to insert xx.xx.xx.in-addr.arpa. It has been a long wild goose chase.

Can someone kindly point me to the right direction? I am using a Plesk hosting service from a hosting service provider. How can I set this up?

 

[LouisJ]

I'm not sure if this makes a difference. My server rDNS is correctly setup. Other domains are using Plesk mail server with no issues. Thanks

 

[scsa20]

rDNS is done by your VPS provider (or whoever you get your IP address from). Some providers you can set it up through their portal, others you'll need to open a ticket. You just need to review to check their help documentation.

 

[LouisJ]

Thanks! Really appreciate the help!

Just to make sure I understand it correctly. The rDNS for the server is already set up and is correct. What it requires now is to set up the the mail service provider's in-addr.arpa and this is to be done via the VPS provider?

So whenever we use a third party mail hosting provider with Plesk, we need to contact the VPS hosting provider to set up rDNS?

Also, can these be safely removed too?
mail.example.com --- A
webmail.example.com --- A
mail._domainkey.example.com --- TXT
_imaps._tcp.example.com ---- SRV
_pop3s.example.com --- SRV
_smtps.tcp.example.com --- SRV

Thanks!!!

rDNS is done by your VPS provider (or whoever you get your IP address from). Some providers you can set it up through their portal, others you'll need to open a ticket. You just need to review to check their help documentation.

 

[scsa20]

I am not sure what you're referring to when you're saying third party mail hosting provider but the Reverse DNS is done by whoever owns the IP address which would be your VPS provider (Linode, for example, lets you set the rDNS right in their portal, for Azure you would use PowerShell or the Azure CLI, for AWS it's done through the console, and so on and so forth, you just need to check your provider's help documentation or reach out to their support).

As for the extra records, you could, technically, remove them if you're not using them, but it doesn't doesn't hurt keeping them, just depends. For example, the 3 SRV records is used for auto configurating email clients. The TXT record is the default domain key record for DKIM, the A record for webmail is for accessing the web mail, and the mail A record is usually used for the MX record, but depending on how you have things you might not want or need those records.

 

[LouisJ]

Thanks once again!! By third party mail host, I meant email services from gsuite, godaddy, namecheap, hostgator ... etc. Not using Plesk for emails.

Since Plesk is not used for mails, I am thinking if it is a requirement to keep those DNS records.

Also, when I was using cpanel with gsuite or hostinger, I have not encountered any needs to configure rDNS hence wondering if this is only with Plesk that requires this configuration?

 

[scsa20]

If you're using a third party like gsuite, godaddy, etc, then a rDNS isn't required

 

[LouisJ]

Ohhhh however, I get this ERROR: No reverse DNS entries. Does it mean I can ignore this?

 

[scsa20]

Where are you getting that from? Cause if you are using a third party email service you shouldn't be getting that since those third party services would be using their own email servers which has their own rDNS.

 

[LouisJ]

When I use a dns lookup I got that error ERROR: No reverse DNS entries. That's what confused me, shouldn't it be them resolving the rDNS since they are the owners of their IP?

I just noted there is this Duplicate MX A records warning too. I'm currently using the MX records provided by mail host. Could it be due to these two records on Plesk?

mail.example.com --- A
webmail.example.com --- A

 

[scsa20]

If you're doing a normal DNS lookup then you can ignore it.

And as I've mention before, you don't need those records you can remove them.

 

[LouisJ]

Thanks scsa20. Appreciate your help on this. I will just ignore this error.