Game online just fine, but can't visit websites...

[Excellent]

Recently my computer has been having random issues when trying to go to websites. I can game online just fine without a hitch, yet when I try to go to google.com it takes about 5 minutes for the page to come up (sometimes it times out). I do have a firewall, yet when I disable it, I'm still getting the same issue. The issue is usually resolved immediately upon restarting my computer, but it returns after the it's been on for a while.

This is for my directly connected computer, but I also have a laptop (wireless). The laptop has no issues with connecting to websites.

I previously had issues with my computer connecting to .com sites, but it would connect to .edu sites perfectly fine. I was instructed to get a new hosts file. I do not know if the issues are related.

Any input on the issue would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks again,

- Mike

 

[NameBrandHuman]

Have you any virus and spyware protection, if not the run a scan after that see if it improves.

 

[Excellent]

Have Norton 360, I'll check it out when I get home, it should be scanning my computer every night @ 3am though.

Late last night, I was browsing the forums and saw somebody mention the cmd prompt ipconfig/flushdns... So I tried it and it seemed to have fixed the problem for the time being. I'll have to see if it actually fixed the problem when I get home from school tonight. Does this sound like it should have worked, because I have no idea what the command prompt actually does.

 

[NameBrandHuman]

It is possible that could have fixed your problem! Hope you did

 

[Cinders]

The command prompt (run box) allows you to run system utilities that you wouldn't normally have access to from the desktop without digging around in your Windows\system32 folder. The run box assumes the file is in your system32 folder until you tell it differently and then gives the utility whatever command you typed after the "/" symbol. You typed in ipconfig / flushdns, so you told it to run the utility ipconfig and then send it the flush DomainNameSystem command so your computer would "forget" where to send information packets that were destined for to Google and anyother website you have visited. Normally over time your computer "learns" where Google is and then sends packets to Google's ip address by the quickest way possible. Sometimes the DNS info gets messed up and your computer "learns" to send the information packets to the wrong place so a response from Google is either very slow in returning or lost completely.

 

[DelJo63]

Your school vs home environments will mess you up.

Whenever you switch from on to the other,
right-click Pgm Files->accessories->CMD Prompt
run as and

enter an Admin account / pwd
enter ipconfig /flushdns​

enter control

click Admin Tools->Services
find the DNS Client
right-click->restart​