Send and Receive Email on Your Dreamcast via Gmail
Most of us are no longer able to send mail on our Dreamcast and many cannot receive mail either. The internet has progressed since 1999 and the simple method of sending and receiving mail that the Dre
Requirements
1. A Sega Dreamcast with a modem or broadband adapter (BBA)
2. You must be able to connect your Dreamcast to the Internet by one of the following methods:
- Traditional dial-up
- Broadband Adapter
- "PC-DC server" or "Netopia Router" method.
3. A Windows PC with connection to the Internet and administrator privileges.
Note:
- If you connect your Dreamcast via dial-up, you must be able to have your PC online at the same time with a separate public IP.
- The most common scenario is to have the Dreamcast connected via dial-up and your PC connected to a broadband connection.
4. If connecting with dial-up in conjunction with a broadband connection, you must have access to your router or modem setup. We will be forwarding 2 ports.
5. A Dreamcast web browser.
6. A Gmail account. I recommend creating one specifically for this tutorial.
7. Basic familiarity with networking, i.e. an understanding of IP addresses and ports is preferred. This guide should work for most people but is not dummy-proof. You may have to do some troubleshooting on your own.
2. Dreamcast Settings
In your respective Dreamcast browser, (Planetweb, Dreamkey, XDP, Dreampassport etc.) you will need to create a new mail account. This can be any username and password you choose, but be sure to remember or write it down for setting up the mail server in section 4.
If your Dreamcast and Windows PC are on the same network (BBA, PC-DC Server, Netopia)
- Enter the LAN IP address of your Windows PC that will be running the mail server under the POP3 and SMTP server settings.
If your Dreamcast and Windows PC are on different networks (PC is connected to broadband and Dreamcast is connected via dialup)
- Enter the WAN IP address of your Windows PC that will be running the mail server under the POP3 and SMTP server settings.
You can find your WAN IP address by going to the following address: http://www.whatismyip.com/
3. Getting Started - PC
You will first need to enable your Gmail account for POP3 access. Google provides a simple set of instructions here:
https://support.google.com/mail/troubleshooter/1668960?hl=en#ts=1665119
Download and install the mail server program:
CMailServer - Mail Server Software for Windows
If your Dreamcast will be communicating with your mail server over the internet (i.e. your PC is connected to a broadband connection and your Dreamcast is connecting via dialup) you will need to make sure that your router and/or modem firewall(s) allow traffic over ports 25 and 110. Every piece of hardware has a slightly different setup and therefore the specifics of doing this step are outside the scope of this tutorial.
*If you have trouble sending or receiving email after following this tutorial, this is the most likely thing to be setup incorrectly*
4. Configuring CMailServer
From the top menu select Account>Create new account
Here you will add the details of the account you created on the Dreamcast. Enter the user name and password. The rest can be left default
In the same window select the "Remote POP3" tab
Select "Add New" and enter the account (user name) and password of the Gmail account you created. Enter everything else as shown below
Select the "Email Forwarding" tab and check the boxes for "Enable email forwarding" and "Leave messages on local server"
Click OK when you are finished
From the top menu select Tools>Configuration
Select "Run as Internet mail server"
Select "Single Domain" and enter the domain of your Dreamcast's email address (the domain is what follows the @ symbol in the address)
Click on the "Advanced" button
You can enter the Primary Internet DNS as 8.8.8.8 (Google's DNS server)
Enter everything else as shown below, substituting your own Gmail address in the "ISP email address" and "ISP login account" boxes
Update: I've learned that google changed their SMTP server to smtp.googlemail.com
Enter your Gmail password in the "Password" box
Important Note:
If you want to have someone send mail to your Dreamcast, have them send it to your Gmail account, not the account you created on the Dreamcast/Mail Server. The mail server will automatically download from Gmail and forward to the Dreamcast account.
Congratulations, you should now be able to send and receive mail on your Dreamcast.
