Forum hard to get to

[fla]

A similar thread discussed this recently here. In that thread I mentioned that the retry button always worked immediately. Recently I've had cases where three or four retry clicks were necessary. If several people using various ISP's and various routers have issues with a single site, my instincts tell me that site is somehow special.

[imagn]

I wish to add that i have been experiencing this problem too, but only from my home computer network, and on all three computers that are on the network, when i am at work i have no problems on the first try

[sub]

As mentioned on the last page, try temporarily adding a hosts file entry for the gbpvr.com to see if it helps.

[donschjr]

I've added the host file settings and it seems to be working ok so far, am I right in thinking if the site address changes I'll have to go in and remove that entry?

[sub]

I've added the host file settings and it seems to be working ok so far, am I right in thinking if the site address changes I'll have to go in and remove that entry?

Yes. I'd suggest maybe only leaving it there for a week or so, then try removing it to see if the problem comes back.

[leaded1]

I've had this problem for a while (have to click refresh multiple times before the forums will load) and just found something that seemed to fix it. (thanks Lifehacker!) It seems like the problem is a bad local dns cache entry for gbpvr.com. I cleared this cache on both of the computers I was having problems from and it solved it for me.

in a command window run the following command:

ipconfig /flushdns

Disclaimer: this flushes your whole local DNS Resolver Cache, it might slow down you surfing for a few days while you build the cache back up. I personally haven't noticed any slow down though...

hope this helps,
Leaded

[fla]

Before clearing the cache it would be great if people experiencing the problem took a look at the cache contents.

Code:

ipconfig /displaydns > dns.txt

Then search for gbpvr related records in dns.txt and post the bad records. Maybe the source of the problem can be identified.

I can't see any records relating to gbpvr in my dns cache. Perhaps the ISP hosting gbpvr is using a strange TTL?

[whurlston]

One of the first things I usually do when setting up a Windows machine is to disable DNS caching. It's used by viruses to prevent you from getting to virus removal websites like symantec.com.

This of course adds a little overhead whenever you browse to a website but with broadband speeds, its a non issue.

[mian]

I've been having intermittent issues with a large variety of sites for a couple of months now. I figured it was router related, and I honestly can't remember the admin password, and I didn't want to reset it and then have to set it up again, so I've been grinding my teeth as sites would often require reloading repeatedly before a connection was actually made.

I flushed my dns as per leaded1's suggestion (sadly before I read the next post, sorry fla), and haven't had it happen since. Everything is loading quick as a whip in fact.

I'm starting to think maybe I should shut off caching altogether like whurlston. I don't have insanely fast broadband, but it is broadband, and my post-flush performance is snappy.

[fla]

Here's what the forums dns cache entry looks like for me...Quite normal

Code:

forums.gbpvr.com
         ----------------------------------------
         Record Name . . . . . : forums.gbpvr.com
         Record Type . . . . . : 5
         Time To Live  . . . . : 1536
         Data Length . . . . . : 4
         Section . . . . . . . : Answer
         CNAME Record  . . . . : gbpvr.com

Today I had the problem and examined the cache and the entry was gone (as expired entries should). Flushing the cache with ipconfig /flushdns made no difference (obviously since there was no longer an entry for the forums). If there's a bad dns cache entry somewhere, it must be in my firewall or at my ISP but in my case I can't blame Windows' dns cache.

Oh BTW your broadband speed has little to do with DNS lookup speeds. The DNS protocol packets are tiny so the speed is almost entirely dependant on how loaded the DNS server you are pointing at is.