Codeigniter $this->email->send() not working while mail() does

I can’t figure out why if I try to use the CI Email Class it doesn’t send emails, while if I use the native PHP mail() Class works.

Has to be noted that sometimes I get “email sent” while is not actually sent and sometimes I get the error “my server is not setup”.

I tried to figure out how to set it up but… nothing…

Controller code follows:

 if($this->form_validation->run()){

                //Set Language
                $this->lang->load('site', $this->session->userdata('lang'));

                //Random key
                $user_valid_key = md5(uniqid());

                //Prepare email
                $this->load->library('email', array('mailtype' => 'html'));
                $this->email->from($this->config->item('email_signup_from'), 'Wondermark.net');
                $this->email->to($this->input->post('email'));
                $this->email->subject($this->lang->line('email_signup_subject'));

                //Format mail con %s per inserire i campi necessari
                $signup_msg = sprintf($this->lang->line('email_signup_message'), $this->input->post('fname'), base_url().'main/signup_confirm/'.$user_valid_key);

                $this->email->message((string)$signup_msg);

                if($this->email->send()){
                    //TODO: load view...
                    echo "email sent";
                }else{
                    $to = $this->input->post('email');
                    mail($to, 'test', 'Other sent option failed');
                    echo $this->input->post('email');
                    show_error($this->email->print_debugger());
                }

                //TODO: Add to db

            }else{

            // Form validation failed

}

Answer

Use this setup email..

$this->load->library('email');

$config['protocol']    = 'smtp';
$config['smtp_host']    = 'ssl://smtp.gmail.com';
$config['smtp_port']    = '465';
$config['smtp_timeout'] = '7';
$config['smtp_user']    = '[e-mail]';
$config['smtp_pass']    = 'password';
$config['charset']    = 'utf-8';
$config['newline']    = "rn";
$config['mailtype'] = 'text'; // or html
$config['validation'] = TRUE; // bool whether to validate email or not      

$this->email->initialize($config);

$this->email->from('[e-mail]', 'sender_name');
$this->email->to('[e-mail]'); 
$this->email->subject('Email Test');
$this->email->message('Testing the email class.');  

$this->email->send();

echo $this->email->print_debugger();