[Ubuntu-SG] [Slugnet] DNS on Ubuntu question

[desire at gmail.com]

On Mon, Aug 30, 2010 at 8:23 AM, Mark Philip <mphilip27 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi all,
> I'm using Ubuntu 10.04 on a netbook.
> I'm connected to Starhub at home via wifi.
> When I check on my connection, it reports that my primary DNS is my
> wireless router's IP address, whilst my secondary DNS is the Starhub
> IP.
>
> Is this correct? I did not enable any DNS services on the router, as
> it is set to obtain the DNS directly from Starhub. As a result, when I
>

It obtains these settings via DHCP from your wireless router; your wireless
router probably has a DNS proxy.


> surf the Internet, it takes a while to look up webpages as it
> traverses the primary DNS first.
>
> Is there a way to remove the primary DNS lookup from Ubuntu and
> replace it with Starhub's DNS server instead?
>

I'm not sure if that would help.  I experienced dns lookups that timeout and
web sites that fail to resolve until I do a refresh, and I've attributed
this (without much substantiation) to something to do with Starhub's DNS
servers.  It does seem to have improved recently though.  Have you checked
whether

- DNS queries to your router actually resolve?
- is the slow resolution caused by querying the router?

I've also considered switching to other DNS servers, eg. opendns, google
public dns, pacific internet or singnet dns, etc.  Conclusion was that
switching would make overall browsing slower, as content distribution
networks based on anycast dns would serve content via non-optimum network
paths (eg, via servers in hong kong or the US instead of servers within
starhub's velocity program in singapore).  So I'd just about given up and
resigned myself to reloading where necessary - but seriously, my perception
is that this problem isn't as bad as it was in the past.

The other alternative, of course, is to run your own dns resolver.  Perhaps
on your wireless router.
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