Cannot remove nameservers in GoDaddy when moving away from their hosting to external hosting

Question

I will try to describe as best I can:

I have a GoDaddy hosting that came with a free domain name. I am now aware how bad GoDaddy is and have purchased hosting elsewhere, I need to change the DNS on the domain located at GoDaddy as the hosting I have do not allow for domain transfers.

I enter into the DNS records for my domain name and find the name servers section:

I have added the new ones as shown, however when I try to delete the old ones (top 2) it says they are read-only? Are GoDaddy providing a restrictive service here? Do I need to 'unlock' them? There is no option to do so in the menu.

If this cannot be resolved, how would I go about un-registering my domain name with GoDaddy and then buying it again through my new provider? is this possible. Any other options for me?

Solution

It's taken me a while to work this one out in the past. Dan is right in his comment above. To change the nameservers you can't do this from within the DNS Manager, you have to do it from within the Domain Manager. In case anyone else finds this question and is using their Premium DNS service as I have done for domain names not registered with GoDaddy (GoDaddy refer to these as off-site domains), the same still applies also.

1. After logging into My Account, click Launch next to Domains.

2. Click on the drop-down arrow to the right of the domain name you wish to update.

3. Select Set Nameservers from the drop-down context menu.

4. You'll then see a popup dialog from where you can select Custom nameservers and then specify them and click Save.

There are no restrictions forcing you to use GoDaddy's DNS services, unless you wish to use the vanity nameservers feature which then requires the domain registration and DNS to be with the same company in order to work for technical reasons (glue records).

Comments

[dan]

Good screenshots, and point about the vanity nameservers - they do need to correspond to a domain inside the same GoDaddy account (some GoDaddy users have several accounts).