Specs on new SmarterMail server

Question asked by Matthew Titley - 10/29/2025 at 7:06 PM

Unanswered

Hi all,

We are planning out our next SmarterMail server which will include a migration of a few TB of data from old server to new. Have always been on Windows Server but am investigating the pros/cons of switching to a Linux platform. Although we have reasonably good Linux talent in house, Microsoft operating systems are still our stronger suit. So, I'd like to hear what the community is doing. Have many of you moved from Windows to Linux? This would be a migration so moving the message store and all the associated files from Win to Linux is a slightly more complicated process, including the changes in file locations, etc., than staying in the Windows ecosystem. Maybe it would be an easier call if it was a new server with new domains rather than a migration, but that's not reality for us.

Curious to hear if others have made the switch or are doing something altogether different, such as running SM on OS/2... :P

Thx,

Matt

6 Replies

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Matt Petty Replied

10/29/2025 at 8:10 PM

Employee Post

I got SM running on ARM on a palm sized board and a USB stick last year experimentally :P
https://portal.smartertools.com/community/a96260/smartermail-running-on-an-orange-pi-zero-3-arm_.aspx

Ever since we've been moving SM to linux I've strayed further from windows. Just VMs now, even at home I have a gaming VM for games. We develop on Macbooks believe it or not. It's been very nice and I reference AI often for various commands still sometimes but I've started getting used to all the commands. So I can recommend referencing AI for learning commands just make sure you give your system details when chatting. I use Ubuntu + Docker mostly except when doing some spot testing for various things.

We do have some guides for moving to Linux and SM itself does a lot of the heavy work automatically if you get all the folders lined up in the correct spots.

Reference: https://portal.smartertools.com/kb/a3691/migrating-smartermail-to-linux.aspx

Edit: I thought I'd include another good strategy lately. You can run a new server migrate domains one at a time into a RUNNING SmarterMail server via the "attach domain" options. This is a bit more manual but allows you to do it at your own pace as domains get moved, this also helps if you have your domains in many different locations. (domains can be moved between windows <-> linux)
Ref: https://portal.smartertools.com/kb/a2726/move-a-domain-from-one-smartermail-server-to-another.aspx

Matt Petty Senior Software Developer SmarterTools Inc. www.smartertools.com

Brian Bjerring-Jensen - VonBjerring GmbH Replied

10/30/2025 at 3:25 AM

Staying on windows for a while. I dont have the ressources to migrate to linux. I have toyed with windows as an admin for 35 yrs so pretty confident in thats sphere...

JerseyConnect Team Replied

10/30/2025 at 7:40 AM

We're sticking with Windows for SmarterMail even though our environment is more Linux servers. Nothing is really pushing us to Linux and we definitely don't need another project. We also run SM on a VM.

Gabriele Maoret - SERSIS Replied

10/30/2025 at 8:01 AM

I'm testing Linux in a on -premise customer server and it seems to work fine, but our Cloud Server (nearly 3TB of mails...) is on Windows and no plan to migrate yet...

Gabriele Maoret - Head of SysAdmins and CISO at SERSIS Currently manages 6 SmarterMail installations (1 in the cloud for SERSIS which provides services to a few hundred third-party email domains + 5 on-premise for customers who prefer to have their mail server in-house)

Tan Replied

11/3/2025 at 3:23 AM

Same here. We are sticking with Windows for SmarterMail. But incoming gateway are converted to Linux 😀

George To Replied

11/13/2025 at 2:25 AM

We stick with Windows too.

At least, it contains Windows Defender.

We believe - Defender with ClamAV, it is a very good antivirus combination already.

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