DNS unavailable
 

Well, hell. I'm suddenly unable to connect to certain sites on one laptop but not the other. When I run network troubleshooting it says "your dns server may be unavailable." I tried resetting dns cache and IP, but no joy. When I was following the instructions to reset those, I also got a message that "no operations can be performed while media is disconnected." I think I fixed that, but still can't connect to specific sites.

I'm on the "bad" laptop now and can get here, obviously. I can google and the results list will display but I can't click into any of the sites. An example of a bookmarked page that won't display is publix.com

I can get to google and gmail, for example. I also tried restoring the computer but that didn't help.

Seems to be independent of browser -- same problem on chrome, firefox, and IE.

We reset our router and was able to get on to Yahoo! mail but having problems with other websites. We have CenturyLink and we are south of 466 and north of 466A. We also cleared the DNS cache and still having problems.

I had the same problem, when I used CenturyLink for my ISP. Of course, they told me there was nothing wrong with their DNS server.

However, I changed my DNS server to Google's public service and I have never had another problem, like the type your describe.

Here's the info. from Google:

• Google Public DNS is a free, global Domain Name System (DNS) resolution service, that you can use as an alternative to your current DNS provider. To try it out: Configure your network settings to use the IP addresses 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 as your DNS servers

You might give it a shot to see if it corrects your issue. It's easy to switch back, if it doesn't help.

Same problem here with CenturyLink. First time it happened, I did get them to admit it was their DNS server that was having the resolution problems. 2nd time, which was last week, it was all on my end, according to them. The CL tech had me reset my DNS settings to 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 instead of the standard DHCP. You can also try to flush your DNS cache. Open a command prompt and type ipconfig /flushdns.

I find it interesting that they would have me use the Google DNS instead of their own. BTW, no problems since then.

Eh, I gave up around 4am and now everything is fine again this morning. I'm blaming CenturyLink, but it is odd that it was only one laptop. It is the older one.

Thanks for the help and the the Google DNS info -- I think I'll switch to that. I've also been having to disconnect/reconnect my wireless connection 2-3 times a week lately.

Update: When I was changing the DNS settings, I noticed that the problematic old laptop has two network settings, TCP/IPv4 and TCP/IPv6, while the new one only has v6. I didn't make any changes but that is the only difference I saw between the one that worked and the one that didn't.

Get some canned air and blow the dust out of the laptop. Sometimes a little excessive heat will cause all kinds of strange problems. :coolsmiley:

Thanks, Kayaker, I'll give that a try as well.