Setting Up Google Apps (mail, calendar, docs…) After Domain and Hosting Transfer From Dreamhost to GoDaddy

Notice: This post is directed towards those who have transferred a domain to GoDaddy that has previously been setup with Google Apps at another host. If you have any questions please post in the comments.

I recently transferred my domain and hosting from Dreamhost to GoDaddy. I would first like to thank Jeremy for helping me by pointing me in the right direction when I had no idea what to do.

My problem was that the forwarding mail.nathat.com was no longer redirecting me to google.com/a/nathat.com/#inbox. This is not a huge problem, but is annoying, because mail.nathat.com is easier to remember. The main problem was that the email addresses I had with Google Apps (nathat[at]google.com, ect…) no longer had the ability to send or receive after transferring the domain to GoDaddy. When I tried sending an email to my @nathat.com addresses, it would fail. When I tried sending a domain from my @nathat.com addresses, nothing would happen.

After reading around on the internets and talking to Jeremy I knew that I would somehow need to change my CNAME and MX settings with the domain.

To do this, you need to log into your GoDaddy account, and go to the “Domain Manager” – It is on the left sidebar. Once the page loads, find your domain and click on it. You should now see a page like this:

You will now need to click on “Total DNS Control and MX Records” located on the right side of the image I uploaded, or in the middle of the page, if you are looking at your personal GoDaddy Domain Manager. After you have click on that link, you will see a lot of information. You must now locate the “CNAMES” and check to make sure none of the “Host” values are either mail, docs, start, or calendar. If any of them are, then you must select them by clicking on the little peice of paper and pencil to the right of the values and change the “Points to Host Name” value to “ghs.google.com” (without quotes) If none of those host values are already there, then skip the next mini paragraph

For example: When I first looked at my “CNAMES” I already have a “mail” host pointing towards some sercureserver.com address. I left the host as “mail” and just changed the “Points to Host Name” value to “ghs.google.com”

You must make sure you have the host values “mail, docs, start, and calendar” CNAMES all created and pointing at “ghs.google.com”   After this has been done, now you need to create new MX (Mail Exchange) Records. We’re still on the same page we added the new CNAMES, we’ve just scrolled down a bit. You should now see a button labeled “Add New MX Record” – click this and create the following values.

Host Name: @
Enter Goes To Address: aspmx.l.google.com
Priority: 10

Host Name: @
Enter Goes To Address: alt1.aspmx.l.google.com
Priority: 20

Host Name: @
Enter Goes To Address: alt2.aspmx.l.google.com
Priority: 30

Host Name: @
Enter Goes To Address: aspmx2.googlemail.com
Priority: 40

Host Name: @
Enter Goes To Address: aspmx3.googlemail.com
Priority: 50

After you are done enterting these records, give the DNS a bit to get everything sorted out. In my case, this only took about 30 minutes, but it could take up to 48 hours. I can now login and send/receive emails once again! Let us know in the comments if this helped you get Google Apps setup!