I'd done with Cpanel because of Exim

[bmcpanel]

I have been a loyal customer of Cpanel for nearly 4 years. During that time, I have seen our support queue get dominated by email problems caused by Exim. As the old saying goes, if it has not been one thing, it has been another.

I certainly do not have an inkling of a clue why Cpanel would continue to use Exim as the mta when so many people have complained about it. We use Plesk Linux and Plesk Windows servers also and do not have nearly the amount of problems as with Cpanel/Exim.

Quite frankly, Cpanel is costing me too much time and money.

Thus, I have decided to not order any more Cpanel servers. Any new servers will be brought onto our Plesk servers and new server orders will be Plesk at this time. I will continue to use Cpanel servers for my existing customers, but that is it. Once they migrate off, no more.

 

[IRCBrasil]

Install csf (http://www.configserver.com/cp/csf.html) with automatic RBL blocking and payed confirserver mailscanner service (http://www.configserver.com/cp/mailscanner.html - just US 35,00 ontime fee) and adios e-mail problems.

 

[webignition]

We use Plesk Linux and Plesk Windows servers also and do not have nearly the amount of problems as with Cpanel/Exim.

In what way are the Plesk servers different when it comes to mail?

And in what ways are Plesk servers better than cPanel servers, again when it comes to mail? I'm simpy curious here and am not disagreeing at all - just interested to find out why!

 

[rikgarner]

Which MTA are you planning on using with Plesk? Qmail?

Rich

 

[bmcpanel]

In what way are the Plesk servers different when it comes to mail?

And in what ways are Plesk servers better than cPanel servers, again when it comes to mail? I'm simpy curious here and am not disagreeing at all - just interested to find out why!

I have heard people talk about Exim as if it is no different than other mta's in performance, but the proof is in the pudding as far as I am concerned. We have had 1 plesk server for over a year and 2 others for around 8 months, and about 25% of our customers are now on Plesk as opposed to Cpanel or Ensim. Of all of the support tickets we answered in the previous month, this is how it broke down....

Cpanel customers, percent of Cpanel tickets relating to email.... 39%

Plesk customers, percent of Plesk tickets relating to email.... 14%

Ensim customers, percent of Ensim tickets relating to email.... 9%

(Statistically, about 60% of our customers are on Cpanel, 25% on Plesk and 15% on Ensim. Our ticket queue is on average of 350-400 service tickets per month)

Those stats are typically like that every month. Some months, Cpanel tickets concerning email exceed 50% of all Cpanel related tickets. It has been exhausting, dealing with Exim.

I wear many hats in my business, and I am sure many of you do also. We have installed firewalls, mail scanners, etc. in an attempt to help exim by defeating spam so it does not have to work so far. But nohting seems to ever get better with exim.

One of my jobs is that I must procure software that is going to work and not cause problems. Those statistics above tell me everything I need to know. Those statistics have been typical each month. If it weren't for Exim, we could keep offering Cpanel. However, I must face facts and make a good business decision. No more new Cpanel servers.

 

[BianchiDude]

What MTA do Plesk and Ensim use?

 

[chirpy]

I can say that I've had and seen very few issues with exim at all. I remember the bad old days of using sendmail and certainly had more issues with that. From the 100's of servers I work on, I've found very few issues that were either configuration mistakes or end-user mistakes.

I've heard horror stories about most MTA's, the worst probably being qmail, though some love it. I particularly like exim as it is highly configurable and easy to do - definitely unlike sendmail and qmail.

Each to their own opinion. If you don't like it, there's plenty of choice of other control panels if you cannot cope with it.

 

[FlyingDiver]

Could you give some background on the kinds of problems your customers (on cPanel/exim) are reporting?

Also, what MTA do you have enabled on the Plesk/Ensim platforms?

Thanks!

joe

 

[ramprage]

I have to admit I've seen Cpanel update itself even with autoupdate off and break things, like Exim or Named or whatever...

Edit: friggin' typos

 

[electron33]

I agree with chirpy. Exim has been by far the most reliable and trouble-free MTA I have used.

 

[jester.ro]

let's not get into a MTA war here.

apart from sendmail, wich is really old, qmail, postfix, exim work fine as long as they're configured correctly.

I for one am a qmail fan, a have many servers running qmail, as well as alot of servers with cpanel/exim.

All of them work fine. As long as you see/know their limits, you're fine. For instance, it would be silly to use a cluster of exims to send tens of thousends of emails /hour. Exim has it's limits, but it gains in ease of configurability and use.

Qmail is a pain to configure/patch, but once you did it, it will stay that way for years, all you need to do is upgrade clamav and other scanners you're using.

Plesk is configuring qmail by itself, it includes most of the necesarry patches, but god forbids you try to change something or add another patch.

Don't think your life will be easier with plesk. It's clear to me that your problems are at the customer's end. I doubt that all your cpanels are configured differently, and yet for some customers cpanels work ok.

 

[bmcpanel]

I can say that I've had and seen very few issues with exim at all. I remember the bad old days of using sendmail and certainly had more issues with that. From the 100's of servers I work on, I've found very few issues that were either configuration mistakes or end-user mistakes.

I've heard horror stories about most MTA's, the worst probably being qmail, though some love it. I particularly like exim as it is highly configurable and easy to do - definitely unlike sendmail and qmail.

Each to their own opinion. If you don't like it, there's plenty of choice of other control panels if you cannot cope with it.

Certainly, it is not a matter of "can't" cope with it, but rather a choice "not to" cope with it. That is my choice.

The statistics from our support center tell the facts. The most important fact I have found is, there are more problems with the exim mta, based on my experience within the bounds of my company. An unacceptable level of support requests compared to other CP and mta combos.

JMHO.

 

[bmcpanel]

let's not get into a MTA war here.

apart from sendmail, wich is really old, qmail, postfix, exim work fine as long as they're configured correctly.

I so strongly disagree. Exim is simply a lightweight mta that is not very efficient in how it handles email, at least how it is configured on the cpanel system. Some mta's are superior to others. It is my experience that exim is inferior.

Exim is just sendmail on steroids, afterall. Isn't that how exim came to be? I just don't think it is robust enough to be in a production web hosting environment. I am sure I am not the only cpanel server admin who believes this to be true.... exim apologists aside.

 

[bmcpanel]

What MTA do Plesk and Ensim use?

qmail is what is on our Plesk servers.

 

[bmcpanel]

Could you give some background on the kinds of problems your customers (on cPanel/exim) are reporting?

Also, what MTA do you have enabled on the Plesk/Ensim platforms?

Thanks!

joe

Sure. Do a search on "exim problem" on this forum and you will see a list of the types of problems we have had. We've seen 'em all in 4 years.

My biggest complaint is its inefficiency. It just seems to raise a high load to do simple mailing tasks. I believe this has to do with the way it uses sockets. Not sure.

 

[jester.ro]

would be best to give us some exaples of tickets.

cose the way i see it, there are only 2 kinds of tickets:

1. referring to a general problem of exim/email system. That means crash, config error, feature missing/not implemented. All of these can be fixed by the admin.

2. specific problems with certain customers: well, if only 10 customers of 1000 on cpanel boxes have that problem, the problem lies with them,and they'll probably have the same issues on plesk/qmail.


Well anyway, i'm not trying to change your mind or anything, the way you run your servers is up to you, but altough i've had my share of cpanel issues in the past, i hate it when i see pointless bashing (no offence please, none intended).

 

[bmcpanel]

would be best to give us some exaples of tickets.

cose the way i see it, there are only 2 kinds of tickets:

1. referring to a general problem of exim/email system. That means crash, config error, feature missing/not implemented. All of these can be fixed by the admin.

2. specific problems with certain customers: well, if only 10 customers of 1000 on cpanel boxes have that problem, the problem lies with them,and they'll probably have the same issues on plesk/qmail.


Well anyway, i'm not trying to change your mind or anything, the way you run your servers is up to you, but altough i've had my share of cpanel issues in the past, i hate it when i see pointless bashing (no offence please, none intended).

Slow down there cowboy. I am not seeking support so I don't see a need for me to give examples just because you are an exim fan. I am not trying to convince you. I could frankly care less what you think. If you are an exim supporter, then good for you. I am stating my opinion and my experience. If you don't like it, then so be it. However, it is my guess that my opinion is shared by a large segment of cpanel users and former cpanel users.

Bashing? When did honest criticism become bashing anyway? Please don't try to silence others by claiming their opinions are somehow not warranted just because you disagree with them. That only works with weak minded individuals.

 

[jester.ro]

Sure. Do a search on "exim problem" on this forum and you will see a list of the types of problems we have had. We've seen 'em all in 4 years.

My biggest complaint is its inefficiency. It just seems to raise a high load to do simple mailing tasks. I believe this has to do with the way it uses sockets. Not sure.

Have you done this test the right way?
IE not using any scanners/addons for exim? That's the way to test it. For instance, using qmailscanner + clamav + spamassasin takes a dualcore with scsi subsytem to a crawl on heavy email usage. Switching to a non-perl scanner helps alot. Qmail IS faster than exim, this is clear to all of us i think, but loding it with all kinds of virus/spam scanners makes tham perform on par.

 

[bmcpanel]

Have you done this test the right way?
IE not using any scanners/addons for exim? That's the way to test it. For instance, using qmailscanner + clamav + spamassasin takes a dualcore with scsi subsytem to a crawl on heavy email usage. Switching to a non-perl scanner helps alot. Qmail IS faster than exim, this is clear to all of us i think, but loding it with all kinds of virus/spam scanners makes tham perform on par.

I have had various add-ons to exim and I have had no add-ons to exim when we first started with cpanel. At no time in the past 4 years have I felt that exim was without problems, regardless of which configuration we have tried.

The formulation of my views on Exim come from our help desk support queue. I could go back for years and see the high-level of exim related issues when we began using Cpanel. I remember distinctly that we began to see high levels of support tickets in regard to email. I hoped it would calm down, and sometimes it did. But, overall, support requests for email are high in regard to exim.

I am just someone whose experience tells them that it is time to get away from exim. I state my opinions here not to bash anyone, in particular, cpanel. I love Cpanel. I have stuck it out for 4 years. But after the last 6 months, it seems like our email queue in regard to exim issues has increased even more. I am simply, and personally, tired of dealing with this mta. I wish Cpanel would consider a different mta, or even provide a choice of exim and qmail for example.

 

[bmcpanel]

Far from me to try to offend you in any way (i even stated that). You don;t owe me anything. But posting you opinion here, and backed by your experience might be enough reason for others to go your way without even knowing WHY.

And if you would have read my first post, you would have seen that i am not a supporter of any MTA. Each one has it's advantages (except sendmail :P )

Fair enough.