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Your ISP's DNS servers are the best choice for use as your DNS servers. In theory, yes. Your ISP is obligated to provide them, and they're probably very close

by Zak 17y ago

Your ISP's DNS servers are the best choice for use as your DNS servers. In theory, yes. Your ISP is obligated to provide them, and they're probably very close on the network. In practice, I've seen shockingly slow DNS on fairly high-speed internet connections. Switching to 8.8.8.8 or 4.2.2.2 on those connections drastically improved web browsing.

blhack 17y ago
Another problem is that some ISP DNS servers will redirect you to one of their landing pages when you mis-type a URL.
- jff 17y ago
  Time Warner occasionally sends me to their stupid "landing" page even if I get the address correct. Their DNS service is definitely sub-par.
- alanh 17y ago
  Cox does this, and the results are 100% (shockingly irrelevant) ads.
retube 17y ago
Yes, agreed. I'm on BT Business and their DNS is terrible. With normal browsing the slowest part of a page load was the DNS look up. Doing anything vaguely automated - even when being nice - would result in loads of timeouts. I've since switched to openDNS (free, non-member) and it's been excellent.
- kierank 17y ago
  Same goes with O2. Their DNS gets flaky from time to time. 4.2.2.2 works great.
rg3 17y ago
While not terribly slow, I changed from my ISP's DNS servers to the Google ones because they occasionally don't work. When they work they are pretty fast. However, from time to time they were unresponsive. Sometimes that didn't happen for days, and sometimes they were unresponsive for 30-second bursts several times an hour, and then you couldn't browse the web or check your email. I changed to 8.8.8.8 and waited to see if that was the problem. Since I changed the problem hasn't reappeared, so I keep using 8.8.8.8. I'm no friend of giving Google all my data, but the privacy policy on their DNS servers is quite clear. They don't use the data to correlate it with anything and only cache it for some times for technical reasons, whiping it afterwards. It's fair and doesn't redirect you for failed queries.
dedward 17y ago
Curious - what obligates them to provide DNS service?
- Zak 17y ago
  From a legal point of view, it would be fairly easy to make a case that it's implied when you sell internet access. From a business point of view, failure to provide DNS would appear no different from an outage to the vast majority of users. An ISP that didn't provide DNS would be out of business in very short order.
ryanpetrich 17y ago
Shaw's DNS here in Edmonton is completely down at least a few hours a week; when it is up, it's slow. OpenDNS/Google/4.2.2.2 are both more reliable and faster
amvp 17y ago
I recommend GRC's DNS benchmark. http://www.grc.com/dns/benchmark.htm http://www.grc.com/dns/benchmark.htm - which lets you compare a range of publicly available dns servers, and measures their responsiveness. 8.8.8.8 or 4.2.2.2 maybe easy to remember, but depending where you are on the planet, they aren't necessarily the fastest.

by Zak 17y ago

blhack 17y ago

Another problem is that some ISP DNS servers will redirect you to one of their landing pages when you mis-type a URL.

jff 17y ago
Time Warner occasionally sends me to their stupid "landing" page even if I get the address correct. Their DNS service is definitely sub-par.
alanh 17y ago
Cox does this, and the results are 100% (shockingly irrelevant) ads.

retube 17y ago

Yes, agreed. I'm on BT Business and their DNS is terrible. With normal browsing the slowest part of a page load was the DNS look up. Doing anything vaguely automated - even when being nice - would result in loads of timeouts. I've since switched to openDNS (free, non-member) and it's been excellent.

kierank 17y ago
Same goes with O2. Their DNS gets flaky from time to time. 4.2.2.2 works great.

rg3 17y ago

While not terribly slow, I changed from my ISP's DNS servers to the Google ones because they occasionally don't work. When they work they are pretty fast. However, from time to time they were unresponsive. Sometimes that didn't happen for days, and sometimes they were unresponsive for 30-second bursts several times an hour, and then you couldn't browse the web or check your email. I changed to 8.8.8.8 and waited to see if that was the problem. Since I changed the problem hasn't reappeared, so I keep using 8.8.8.8. I'm no friend of giving Google all my data, but the privacy policy on their DNS servers is quite clear. They don't use the data to correlate it with anything and only cache it for some times for technical reasons, whiping it afterwards. It's fair and doesn't redirect you for failed queries.

dedward 17y ago

Curious - what obligates them to provide DNS service?

Zak 17y ago
From a legal point of view, it would be fairly easy to make a case that it's implied when you sell internet access. From a business point of view, failure to provide DNS would appear no different from an outage to the vast majority of users. An ISP that didn't provide DNS would be out of business in very short order.

ryanpetrich 17y ago

Shaw's DNS here in Edmonton is completely down at least a few hours a week; when it is up, it's slow. OpenDNS/Google/4.2.2.2 are both more reliable and faster

amvp 17y ago

I recommend GRC's DNS benchmark. http://www.grc.com/dns/benchmark.htm http://www.grc.com/dns/benchmark.htm - which lets you compare a range of publicly available dns servers, and measures their responsiveness. 8.8.8.8 or 4.2.2.2 maybe easy to remember, but depending where you are on the planet, they aren't necessarily the fastest.