Hi everyone,

I'm considering starting a hosting business focusing on e-mail hosting for micro companies (in need of 1-2 mail accounts each) and individual customers. I would also offer web hosting.

To begin with I'll test the concept on a small scale (50-100 users); with a reseller account. However, if things run smoothly, I would probably expand to a dedicated server and could reach several thousand users (mail accounts).

Therefore;

1) Which control panel would you reccomend for this operation? How many mail accounts (POP and/or IMAP) is it feasible to manage with for instance Cpanel?

Also, I'd like my clients to be able to use forwarding, change passwords etc. by themselves. I guess I need a simple, straightforward mail control panel for my customers, preferably without a bunch of excess features relared to webhosting as my (e-mail only) customers would not need this.

2) Webmail/helpdesk - as my customers are Norwegian, who offers this as a language option? I believe Horde mail and Perldesk both have this, any other suggestions?

The option to brand the client control panel, webmail & helpdesk with my own logo would also be very valuable.

Any thoughts on these issues would be greatly appreciated....

TMM

Qmailadmin. http://www.inter7.com/qmailadmin/

Thanks, I'll look into Qmailadmin, it looks very interesting.

To start with I think I'll just use a regular control panel though (for small scale testing of the concept), as I'm assuming this will be able to handle maybe 50-100 mail accounts.... correct?

Are there any major differences between CP's like Cpanel, Plesk, Ensim etc. with regards to these issues?

Any general thoughts on handling (many) mail accounts are more than welcome. How is this done by larger ISP's and companies like for instance www.nameplanet.com; does anyone know...?

Thanks,

TMM

Qmail is an awsome mail program.. and qmail admin as suggested above would be perfect for your needs.

Its by far the most stable and will hold the most mail accounts out of all the possibilities.. IMHO of course :)