Slow Wireless/DNS Resolution --help!

[ollywompus]

Ok, looking for some ideas here, because I've run out of them. My setup is:

Dell Inspiron 2200
Cel 1.3
768mb Ram
Running Xubuntu at the moment.
Internal Broadcom Wireless AND/OR
Cisco Aironet 350

So for the last two weeks or so, my computer's net connection has been AGONIZINGLY slow. Or, I should say more importantly it seems to be the DNS portion of web browsing that is slow. It's only on my computer. I've tried everything I can to figure out why.

First I figured maybe it was an issue with Linux, considering it started right after I loaded on a fresh install of Fluxbuntu. But I've tried several distro's since, both *buntu and non-buntu based (including a few live CD's), and I'm having the same issue. So, I figured maybe it was my internal wireless card causing the problem (a Broadcom that was using ndiswrapper). I tried loading up the actual Broadcom drivers (using the bcm-fwcutter trick), still the same problem. So I'm thinking at that point that it was an issue with my wireless card.

So I borrowed a Cisco Aironet 350 from my mom, which has kernel level support built in... same issue.

I'm at the end of my rope here! Does anyone have ANY idea what the hell is going on? As I said, it's not the router, because both my cellphone (which has 802.11g), and my wife's IBM (running both Windows, and running from a Puppy Live CD) don't have this issue.

I say it's a DNS issue because once I'm hooked on to a particular domain/IP, it is quick... so, for example, I can get on to http://www.dslreports.com/stest/ and it runs the test quick as ever... 9mbps down, same as always. But it takes forever to actually GET to the site.

The other place I'll see it is when it's trying to contact repo's during the update process... once it latches onto a repo, it's smoking fast... but it takes forever to do the DNS lookup.

Again, I'm at a total loss... any ideas?

-olly

[seablade]

Do a tracert to your DNS servers and see if there are any major lag points?

Seablade

[ollywompus]

Do a tracert to your DNS servers and see if there are any major lag points?

Seablade

Good call, I'll try that tonight... but why would it only be my lappy that was having problems resolving, if the wife's comp is using the same DNS servers?

-olly

[seablade]

To be honest no clue, but the tracert if it turns up anything may give a good starting place to look. If it doesn't it may mean something specific about the computer, or it may not, but again that step is entirely about trying to find a good starting place to work from to troubleshoot.

Seablade

[ollywompus]

To be honest no clue, but the tracert if it turns up anything may give a good starting place to look. If it doesn't it may mean something specific about the computer, or it may not, but again that step is entirely about trying to find a good starting place to work from to troubleshoot.

Seablade

Thanks man, I'll see what I can figure out.

-olly

[cjcox]

If you have ipv6 enabled, any query will query a AAAA first and then the A record in DNS. Something to consider. Try disabling ipv6 and see if things get faster.

[seablade]

Heh that is a useful tidbit to know, I left networking before ipv6 started actually really being deployed in ANYTHING(Even if it is only rarely used today, its a lot more than it used to be;)

Seablade

[ollywompus]

Ok, disabled ipv6, that helped a little, but still acting strange. A tracepath (used in Ubuntu instead of tracerout) produces:

sudo tracepath 192.168.0.1
1: 192.168.0.100 (192.168.0.100) 0.155ms pmtu 1500
1: 192.168.0.1 (192.168.0.1) asymm 2 4.559ms reached
Resume: pmtu 1500 hops 1 back 2

Any ideas on what this looks means?

Lol, I'm lost.

-olly

[seablade]

Your DNS server is currently set to your local router?

Try to set it directly to an actual DNS server(You should have this address in your router config somewhere or in your documentation from your ISP), your router is probably only forwarding the request and may be slowing things down itself as a result.

Seablade

[ollywompus]

Your DNS server is currently set to your local router?

Try to set it directly to an actual DNS server(You should have this address in your router config somewhere or in your documentation from your ISP), your router is probably only forwarding the request and may be slowing things down itself as a result.

Seablade

See what happens when you know next to nothing about networking?

All right, I'll jump into my router config and see what I can figure out tonight.

Thanks again,

-olly