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Problematic access to various websites


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35 replies to this topic

#1 jaydfox

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Posted 10 May 2006 - 10:22 PM


I guess I'll throw this problem out there for ImmInst users, since I don't know a better place off the top of my head to take this question.

I've got DSL at home, and my laptop is hooked up via ethernet to the DSL router. I have a second laptop, and I'm using an ad hoc wi-fi network (with WEP, the first laptop doesn't support WPA) to connect this second laptop to the first.

I've shared the DSL connection on the first laptop so that the second laptop can access it.

Now, the problem is this:
I can access most websites just fine from the second laptop. However, there are some sites such as slashdot.org, microsoft.com, www.msnbc.msn.com, aol.com, etc., that I cannot get to. In fact, the problem with slashdot actually appears to be a problem with some content on the site that's located somewhere else. In firefox, I can see that several items from slashdot.org are loading, and then the page basically hangs loading something from an.tacoda.net or anrtx.tacoda.net.

Anyway, most other sites are fine, including of course imminst.org, google.com, yahoo.com, intel.com, etc.

So, does anyone have any theories on this? The pages that won't load on laptop #2 load just fine on laptop #1.

#2 jaydfox

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Posted 10 May 2006 - 10:23 PM

BTW, if I ping microsoft.com from laptop #2, I get an IP address, so it's not a DNS issue (well, I doubt it's a DNS issue).

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#3 jc1991

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Posted 10 May 2006 - 10:40 PM

I'm having simialer problems. It isn't the sites you mentioned, but I haven't been able to access several websites over a long period of time, although several people I know have been able to access them. The problem appears to be somewhere along the route betwean myself and my internet provider. (Charter)

#4 jaydfox

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Posted 10 May 2006 - 10:50 PM

Well, I did suspect this at one point, but remember that laptop #1 (which laptop #2 is sharing the DSL connection with) can still get to those sites.

I'm starting to wonder if it's a firewall issue, although I'm only using the standard Windows firewall at the moment (my Agnitum firewall was a little to trigger-happy and blocked my DNS requests, so unless I knew the IP address of the sites I wanted to visit, I couldn't go anywhere). I wouldn't think that the standard Windows firewall would block microsoft.com of all sites. [hmm]

#5 jc1991

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 01:03 AM

I don't think it's the Microsoft firewall. I've tried shutting it off, it doesn't fix the seem to fix the problem. None of my computers (three of them) can access the sites in question, and all of them are on the same router connection, which would suggest that the problem is outside of my network.

#6 jaydfox

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 01:09 AM

Looks like we have different problems then. You should put in a help ticket with your network.

Whatever the problem was with my network last week, that's fixed: I can access the pictures in the sigs that were broken last week. Between that, and the fact that the problem I'm currently experiencing only affects one of two computers accessing the same router, I think this is definitely a new problem.

#7 jc1991

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 11:27 AM

I can access those as well. I've checked the router over several times, but so far nothing has fixed the problem. It's only one or two sites, so it really isn't that much of a problem. I'll probably run over everything once more, and if I can't fix it try reinstalling everything from scratch.

#8 jaydfox

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 07:09 PM

Does anyone else have any ideas?

Also, here's an update. I got a third laptop (a company laptop), and I hooked it up to the wireless network as well. And just like laptop #2, it could get to some sites, but not others. The same sites that were broken on laptop #2 are now broken on laptop #3. E.g., microsoft.com, slashdot.org, aol.com, etc.

Now, because of this problem, I couldn't get to my company's website to access the VPN, so I had connect laptop #3 directly to the DSL modem. After doing this, laptop #3 was able to access all sites.

So I'm almost positive that the problem is with the connection between laptop #1 and the other laptops. I've ruled out the firewall by temporarily disabling it.

So what else could be wrong? I'm starting to wonder if some websites can detect that I'm using some sort of internal network and don't return their packets to the correct destination.

Ideas?

#9 rahein

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 07:20 PM

You say that you can ping the sites that won't load? What IP addresses do they return I can check them aginst what they are for me.

I think the problem might be that lapton #1 is acting as the DNS server for laptops #2 and #3. Try manually setting the DNS server IP address to the routers IP address.

#10 jaydfox

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 07:27 PM

I've checked the IP addresses, they show up the same on laptop #1 and #2. For example, on laptop #2, I get:

C:\Documents and Settings\jaydfox>ping microsoft.com

Pinging microsoft.com [207.46.250.119] with 32 bytes of data:

Request timed out.
Request timed out.

Ping statistics for 207.46.250.119:
    Packets: Sent = 2, Received = 0, Lost = 2 (100% loss),
Control-C
^C

Interestingly, that's not the IP it was earlier. Does microsoft.com have a roaming IP? Earlier it was 207.46.something.else, I don't remember for sure, but it wasn't .250.119.

#11 jaydfox

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 07:32 PM

Ah-ha! It's using 192.168.0.1 as the DNS server. That's the IP address of laptop #1 on the wireless network.

Okay, I'll see if changing that fixes the problem.

#12 rahein

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 07:32 PM

They can have mutlipe IP address for one url.

Thanks for posting that ping.

can you run these two commands and post the results

ping -n 25 www.mircosoft.com
ping -n 25 www.google.com


#13 jaydfox

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 07:43 PM

Hmm, I set my DNS as 192.168.1.254, which is the DNS for the ethernet connection on laptop #1. No change in behavior, however: the same sites that worked before still work, and the same sites that didn't work are still broken.

As for the commands:
C:\Documents and Settings\jaydfox>ping -n 25 www.microsoft.com

Pinging lb1.www.ms.akadns.net [207.46.20.60] with 32 bytes of data:

Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.

Ping statistics for 207.46.20.60:
    Packets: Sent = 25, Received = 0, Lost = 25 (100% loss),

C:\Documents and Settings\jaydfox>ping -n 25 www.google.com

Pinging www.l.google.com [64.233.179.104] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=27ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=28ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=65ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=30ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=34ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=28ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=31ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=30ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=32ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=27ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=30ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=27ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=28ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=28ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=27ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=28ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=30ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=29ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=30ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=28ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=30ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=33ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=30ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=32ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=27ms TTL=244

Ping statistics for 64.233.179.104:
    Packets: Sent = 25, Received = 25, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 27ms, Maximum = 65ms, Average = 30ms

C:\Documents and Settings\jaydfox>


#14 jaydfox

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 07:45 PM

By the way, the pings to www.microsoft.com time out on laptop #1 as well, so I'm mostly concerned with the fact that ping returns an IP address, which means that DNS lookup is working.

#15 rahein

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 07:54 PM

This is weird I can't ping microsoft.com either. They must have ping blocked to help prevent DoS attacks. Try to find another webpage to ping that does not load instead.

#16 jaydfox

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 08:06 PM

Hmm, pinging microsoft.com, aol.com, slashdot.org, all fail. However, I found a website that doesn't load, but I can ping: www.emc.com

C:\Documents and Settings\jaydfox>ping -n 25 www.emc.com

Pinging www.emc.com [168.159.186.196] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=41ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=40ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=40ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=40ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=40ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=44ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=41ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=41ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=42ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=40ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=41ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=44ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=40ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=41ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=40ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=42ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=41ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=41ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=42ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=41ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=44ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=40ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=41ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=42ms TTL=112
Reply from 168.159.186.196: bytes=32 time=805ms TTL=112

Ping statistics for 168.159.186.196:
    Packets: Sent = 25, Received = 25, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 40ms, Maximum = 805ms, Average = 71ms

C:\Documents and Settings\jaydfox>ping -n 25 www.google.com

Pinging www.l.google.com [64.233.179.104] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=32ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=28ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=32ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=29ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=29ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=31ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=32ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=30ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=28ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=31ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=33ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=29ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=27ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=28ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=34ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=31ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=45ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=34ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=30ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=31ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=31ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=33ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=33ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=28ms TTL=244
Reply from 64.233.179.104: bytes=32 time=29ms TTL=244

Ping statistics for 64.233.179.104:
    Packets: Sent = 25, Received = 25, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 27ms, Maximum = 45ms, Average = 31ms

C:\Documents and Settings\jaydfox>


#17 jaydfox

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 08:09 PM

That figures, after I said emc.com wouldn't load, I noticed that it at least receives partial html. I can see the title "EMC Corporation", and when I view source, I get about 100 lines or so.

What does that mean? When I go to www.emc.com from laptop #1, it loads just fine.

Slashdot.org also partially loads on laptop #2. So is it failing out on some other object linked to from the html page that's returned?

#18 jaydfox

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 08:14 PM

BTW, I suppose I should have mentioned this earlier.

These sites used to work! The first night I set up the network, I could access www.microsoft.com, msdn.microsoft.com, www.dell.com, etc.

Now I can't access them...

BTW, I confirmed that www.dell.com won't load, not even a little bit, and here's the ping (quick version):

C:\Documents and Settings\jaydfox>ping www.dell.com

Pinging www.dell.com [143.166.224.178] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 143.166.224.178: bytes=32 time=111ms TTL=242
Reply from 143.166.224.178: bytes=32 time=111ms TTL=242
Reply from 143.166.224.178: bytes=32 time=108ms TTL=242
Reply from 143.166.224.178: bytes=32 time=105ms TTL=242

Ping statistics for 143.166.224.178:
    Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 105ms, Maximum = 111ms, Average = 108ms

C:\Documents and Settings\jaydfox>


#19 jaydfox

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 08:20 PM

Same thing with www.mozilla.com, I can't get to it, but I can ping it. I actually had to load a google cached page (text only even, the regular cache still didn't load) of the firefox download page to get the link, which luckily worked.

Cache (doesn't load):
http://72.14.207.104...us&ct=clnk&cd=1

Cache, text only (does load):
http://72.14.207.104...=en&lr=&strip=1

download link, which worked:
http://download.mozi...=win&lang=en-US

#20 rahein

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 09:45 PM

Do you have a LAN you could hook them up to to see if they work normally when plugged in?

#21 jaydfox

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 09:46 PM

Nope. No LAN. I used to have an Intel 8-port switch, but I don't think I have it with me.

#22 rahein

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Posted 11 May 2006 - 09:57 PM

What OS are you using?

If it is XP or 2000 goto

{windows install folder}/system32/drivers/ect and rename "hosts", it does not have an extension, to "hosts.old".

#23 jc1991

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Posted 12 May 2006 - 12:07 AM

The hosts file shouldn't be the problem, and if it is, it can be edited with notepad. No need to have your computer generate a new one. There shouldn't be anything in there besides the localhost=127.0.0.1 reference plus any custom modifications that you've made.

#24 rahein

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Posted 12 May 2006 - 02:23 PM

I am just pulling at straws now. I don't think I have ever seen the problems Jay is having how. Most my networking experance is wired not wireless though.

#25 jaydfox

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Posted 12 May 2006 - 03:03 PM

I've admitted defeat this round.

The big problem is, I don't know how to search for help on this. I mean, how much help do you think I've found googling anything that contains the terms "wifi" and "laptop"? It's all useless info about how to set up the network in the first place, or about how great it is for travel, etc. I have a very specific problem that unfortunately is described by a lot of very generic terms.

Doesn't load? Heck, I get lots of hits for variants on that as well. The problem usually found? Nothing loads. I don't have that problem.

I tried searching for "some sites" in conjunction with variants of "doesn't load", and found a couple semi-close hits, but still no luck.

And I don't know of any good forums out there that are quick and responsive and insightful. Any help there? Does anyone know a good techie forum?

#26 rahein

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Posted 12 May 2006 - 03:08 PM

Maybe Ars Technica http://episteme.arst...a.com/eve/ubb.x

#27 jaydfox

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Posted 12 May 2006 - 03:29 PM

Hmm, adding "ICS" or "shared connection" to my search parameters turned up a few more hits.

Apparently, lots of people using ICS have had problems getting to MSN, microsoft.com, etc. So this is more common than I thought, but it's very hard to search for.

At any rate, the solution seems to involve using a proxy, though I haven't found details yet on where to install the proxy. I assume I'd install it on laptop #1, the laptop that connects to the internet, and then set up the wireless connection on laptop #2 to use that proxy. But I'm not sure how to do that yet. I've got research to do.

Also, is there a free quality proxy product I can use?

#28 jaydfox

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Posted 12 May 2006 - 03:57 PM

There's a certain irony that ICS is bundled with Microsoft Windows XP, and because of flaws in ICS, I can't get to microsoft.com or any other Microsoft web site (MSN, MSNBC, etc.).

#29 jaydfox

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Posted 12 May 2006 - 04:06 PM

Haven't had time to look into the proxy issue, but I did notice that in addition to the hosts file, there is a "hosts.ics" file, which has the following:

# Copyright © 1993-2001 Microsoft Corp.
#
# This file has been automatically generated for use by Microsoft Internet
# Connection Sharing. It contains the mappings of IP addresses to host names
# for the home network. Please do not make changes to the HOSTS.ICS file.
# Any changes may result in a loss of connectivity between machines on the
# local network.
#

192.168.0.1 computername.mshome.net # 2011 5 2 10 17 31 47 496

(where computername is my company laptop's computer name)

So, any ideas? Might I be able to tweak some of those numbers and fix this?

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#30 rahein

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Posted 12 May 2006 - 04:28 PM

I am not sure what the junk is after the #. But the first part just says that 192.168.0.1 is the IP address of that computer name. This could lead to problem if, for instance, that is the IP address that your router uses.




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