On May 19, 2012 6:46 PM, "Dale" <rdalek1967@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Willie Matthews wrote:
> >

[le snip]

> >
> > You should really try changing you DNS server to some faster ones. I was
> > having this same problem with my ISP or DSL modem with built in router
> > taking a long time. I changed my DNS servers to Google DNS Servers
> > (8.8.4.4 and 8.8.8.8) and haven't had a problem.
> >
> > My setup is a little different but all in all I would really suggest you
> > try a DNS server outside of your ISP.
> >
>
>
> I agree.  My ISP is AT&T and I changed my DNS to Google's too.  It is
> very fast compared to AT&T's servers.  I have had AT&T's servers not
> respond for several seconds but Google's just seem to work.
>

Here's the result of a test comparing the performance of public DNS servers
:

http://www.thousandeyes.com/blog/public-dns-resolver-showdown

Despite what the linked article said, in my experience, Level 3
(4.2.2.[1-5]) is at least as fast as Google. I guess it depends on one's
ISP. But both of them are mucho faster (and much stabler) than my ISP's DNS
servers.

But stay away from OpenDNS like the plague. They are known to perform false
resolve, especially if the domain being resolved does not exist.

Best of all would be to create a list of public DNS servers, and feed it
into a DNS Benchmarking tool, such as this one from GRC:

http://www.grc.com/dns/benchmark.htm

The above tool is how I determine Level 3 to be on a par with Google.
(Sorry, the GRC Tool is Windows-only, but within the article there's an
explanation on how the tool works, so it should be emulatable using bash
and dig).

Rgds,