Web Hosting Talk : Web Hosting Main Forums : Hosting Software and Control Panels : MailEnable VS SmarterMail

[SoftDux]

Hi all,

Can someone, who has used both MailEnable & SmarterMail (preferable the Pro / Enterprise editions) tell me which one

Upto now, we've used SmarterMail 5 as it came bundled with DotNetPanel and never really saw the need to upgrade to SM 6 or SM 7. But now we're moving over to Enkompass, which includes a Lite version of SM 5, which is a bit outdated for a new product.

We've had many problems with SmarterMail, but this could be due to DotNetPanel's bugs as well, I'm not sure.

I have considered MailEnable as an alternative due to the high price of both MailEnable and their support. The community support forum isn't the best in the industry either

So now I installed MailEnable Standard Edition to see how it works, and it seems fairly simple to use. The only real advantage I see of SmarterMail is that the webmail interface looks a bit more professional. BUT, should that really warrant the extra cost? Surely someone logs-in to check mail, not to marvel at a nice-looking web interface? From a normal IMAP / POP3 / SMTP point of view, both look & function the same to the client. So I don't think clients will pack-up and leave cause the webmail interface changed a bit?

But, if anyone has extensively compared these 2 on a functionality level, then please share your experiences with me. I would appreciate some feedback on this.

SmarterMail 7 Pro = $1099 (unlimited domain, to compare with MailEnable)
MailEnable 5 Pro = $349

SmarterMail 7 Enterprise = $1399 (unlimited)
MailEnable 5 Enterprise = $699
MailEnable 5 Enterprise Premium = $1098 (same price as SmarterMail Pro)


Is the extra $700 really worth it?

[ibee]

I use MailEnable for all my windows server and i rate it as the best, i don't see much difference between smartermail and MailEnable, probably if you need bulletproof mailing solutions then you may choose mail servers like smarter or merak.

[SoftDux]

Thanx for eh feedback.

So would you say MailEnable isn't bulletproof?

[ghMike]

At the company I work for, we've had great success with SmarterMail. Customer loves it, especially the web interface (so it may matter), and the server is very reliable. It has had it's ups and downs, but since version 4 we haven't had any major issues. It can also handle a few thousand domains and users on relatively low hardware. 2u servers with quad cores and two/three raid arrays to split IO between spool, storage, and OS.

Sorry, not experience with mailenable however.

And on DotNetPanel, they went open source and offer WebSitePanel now. It's actually pushed Microsoft's Web Platform installer, and the most recent edition works great. Also really easy to install stand alone on a single server, integrates with SmarterMail and Stats, SQL, MySQL, etc. May be worth taking a look to avoid license fees.

[SoftDux]

Originally Posted by ghMike

At the company I work for, we've had great success with SmarterMail. Customer loves it, especially the web interface (so it may matter), and the server is very reliable. It has had it's ups and downs, but since version 4 we haven't had any major issues. It can also handle a few thousand domains and users on relatively low hardware. 2u servers with quad cores and two/three raid arrays to split IO between spool, storage, and OS.

From what I understand, MailEnable should do the same.

Sorry, not experience with mailenable however.

And on DotNetPanel, they went open source and offer WebSitePanel now. It's actually pushed Microsoft's Web Platform installer, and the most recent edition works great. Also really easy to install stand alone on a single server, integrates with SmarterMail and Stats, SQL, MySQL, etc. May be worth taking a look to avoid license fees.[/QUOTE]

I had a look at WebsitePanel and wasn't really impressed with it. When DotNetPanel was a commercial script, it was buggy, and it doesn't seem like many of the bugs we experiences will be fixed right yet. And support was aweful, which doesn't seem to change soon either.
cPanel on the other hand, while also buggy, has a good support track record. And I would rather pay the $50 pm for the license, and know that any issues could be addressed in a matter of hours, than having to sit with something which doesn't get addressed in months at end.

[ghMike]

Good point, guess I never think about that since we pretty much support WSP ourselves. The only major issue we've ran into so far is scheduled tasks though.

[SoftDux]

Originally Posted by ghMike

Good point, guess I never think about that since we pretty much support WSP ourselves. The only major issue we've ran into so far is scheduled tasks though.

Heh,

We had (have) issues with:
BIND crashing on every domain change
scheduled tasks not working properly
SmarterStats which seems to corrupt every 4th or 5th domain's log files.

[AvailHosting-Jeff]

From what I've seen, the added value to customers does not justify the higher price tag of SmartMail. Based on what you've written, you probably don't need a bulletproof solution.

[hostingmaniac777]

Regarding the personal experience with both MailEnable and SmarterMail. Both are good mail servers. If you are looking to cut the price short then you can go for Mailenable standard edition because now it includes Webmail too which was not available in earlier versions of MailEnable. Regarding SmarterMail they have improved the interface a lot but overall functionality is almost the same. If you go for other control panels apart from Enkompass then you may get more flexibility of Mail Server selections since Enkompass has still a long way to compete with the professional control panels like Hosting Controller, Plesk etc which support wide variety of Mail Servers. Though in my personal opinion I like Hosting Controller more than Plesk mainly because of its easily available support for solutions.

[trustworthy]

I think the following links could give you the best opinions about these Mail Servers:
http://forums.smartertools.com/t/12256.aspx
http://forum.mailenable.com/viewtopic.php?t=13085

Originally Posted by hostingmaniac777

If you go for other control panels apart from Enkompass then you may get more flexibility of Mail Server selections since Enkompass has still a long way to compete with the professional control panels like Hosting Controller, Plesk etc which support wide variety of Mail Servers. Though in my personal opinion I like Hosting Controller more than Plesk mainly because of its easily available support for solutions.

Yes Enkompass lags behind by miles from Professional Windows control panels in the market. I like Hosting Controller and it offers dozen of Professional Mail Server softwares like MailEnable, SmarterMail, Exchange Server, Icewarp etc.

[ksugihara]

Those threads are kind of tough. The ME thread is from 2007.

My suggestion is to try out both products. SmarterMail has a free version, and ME has a standard version.

Install them both and see which is easier to install.
Administer them and see which is easier to administer

CONTACT SUPPORT! I cannot explain how much you will be kicking yourself in the teeth if you dont call support ATLEAST once! SmarterTools has state-side support. Not sure about Mail Enable.

Per Mail Enables website:
Standard Class B support tokens are currently priced at $80.00 USD (response within 1 business day)
Priority Class A support tokens are currently priced at $180.00USD (response within 2 hours)

Per SmarterTools Website:
Single Email Support Incident (4 hour SLA, With US support) - $50
Single Phone Support (4 hour SLA, With US support) - $80
Single 24/7 Support Incident (30 minute response) - $199

SmarterTools also has a phone number for support listed on the site. Mail Enable doesnt.

I wouldnt mind hearing feedback, if you do have some after the experience.

[SoftDux]

I had some bad experience with SmarterMail in the past, both with the application and their support. So I brought a support option @ $80, only to be told the problem I'm having wasn't a problem but a feature limitation. And I got no refund. The problem still remained however.

MailEnable, so far, has been easy to install & maintain. I brought the PRO edition, for now, to see how it goes. If all goes well, and my clients are happy then I'll upgrade to the Enterprise edition.

SmarterMail lost a sale on this one, but it didn't seem like they cared.

[WinHostUK]

I've used both in a commercial environment and they're both excellent.

I haven't suffered the technical problems other people have quoted with either -currently we're using SmarterMail but if setting up a new company / server I'd be happy using either.

[Kiamori]

ME has much better support, and is in my opinion a more stable product. SM seems a bit bloated.

[mooodi]

Smarter Mail upgrade protection is too much high. If you didn't upgrade within 12 months then you must pay 80% of the product actual cost. Seems to me Smarter tools are Money suking product..