In the past (v. 4.5.x) I tested CiviMail for bulk mailings and had lots of trouble process bounces via the return channel. I know there is a wonderful plugin for transactional emails, but for bulk mailing, Mandrill is very reasonable and provides some great complimentary reports. I expect it should work with Mandrill's SMTP functionality directly.
So before I dive in, I'm simply asking if anyone has gotten this to work and if so, could you please share your config.
I've been doing some testing with the last release of the Mandrill Emails Extension and it's looking pretty quick and simple with the new version to do both transactional and bulk mailing (CiviMail) through Mandrill. Basically you install it, plug in your Login/API credentials (Administer > System Settings > Mandrill Smtp Settings), and indicate one or both of the types of email you'd like to use Mandrill for:
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To get the report backs on bounces and the like, you use the "Mandrill Post to URL" on that screen to set up a Webhook in your Mandrill account and get notifications for all events except a message being sent:
In the little testing I've been able to do, it seems pretty much plug-and-play in terms of the bounce reporting getting back into CiviCRM.
The updated README is quite thorough, too.
There were a lot of people at CiviCon Denver at the dev ops session using Mandrill for bulk email. I'm not one of them so don't have a config to share, but can confirm that some very experienced providers use it. It was more popular than CiviSMTP or Amazon SES. The only one I recall specifically is CiviDesk, who praised the ability to use sub accounts to track their clients' usage separately. Shoot them an email perhaps?
Have you tried this new extension? https://civicrm.org/extensions/mandrill-email
I tested it. Mandrill processes the bounced emails but Civicrm doesn't pick it up. I might have a settings wrong or missing. Let us know if you find something.
