Disabling DNS client

lynchknot · Post by **lynchknot** » February 4th, 2003, 12:04 pm

I don't know if it's my imagination but I disabled DNS client in XP and it seems like Phoenix is a WHOLE LOT FASTER!

Post by **alanjstr** » February 4th, 2003, 12:06 pm

That's really odd. The DNS client should be caching DNS names, so that you don't have to issue the same thing over and over again and slow everything down.

lynchknot · Post by **lynchknot** » February 4th, 2003, 12:08 pm

Try it - to me it is MUCH faster - I don't know why though.

AtomB · Post by **AtomB** » February 4th, 2003, 1:41 pm

weird it shouldn't make things faster. i'm going to run with mine disabled for a while and see how it goes. i've noticed with about a dozen sites i've tried they seem fast. but hell phoenix is so fast to begin with i'm not sure if it's my imagination.

lynchknot · Post by **lynchknot** » February 4th, 2003, 3:06 pm

This is probably a better idea - but I'm experiencing much faster page rendering

http://www.techtv.com/screensavers/answ ... 07,00.html

lynchknot · Post by **lynchknot** » February 4th, 2003, 3:11 pm

Ok now I see Atomb - techtv says

When you can't get to a webpage because Windows XP or Windows 2000 has cached an unsuccessful DNS lookup, you can:

* Try later (after the cache entry has expired)
* Reboot your computer (which clears the DNS cache)
* Clear (flush) the DNS cache manually (run "ipconfig /flushdns")
* Turn off the "DNS Client" service entirely (hurts performance by requiring unnecessary lookups)
* Disable caching of unsuccessful ("negative") DNS lookups (the best method -- see below)

I don't know why it seems faster at the moment but i'm going to use the reg entry instead.

fingerprint · Post by **fingerprint** » February 4th, 2003, 3:20 pm

Hmm thanks for that link to TechTV. It may be just my imagination but after clearing my cache and history and installing that reg entry they had, my Phoenix seems to render faster. Like I said it's probably all in my head, but that's all that matters right?

fingerprint · Post by **fingerprint** » February 4th, 2003, 3:34 pm

According to Black Viper at http://www.blackviper.com/WinXP/servicecfg.htm this is the description for DNS Client. By the way, if you haven't seen his site before and you are running XP you should really have a look. He describes every XP service and what it does and even has registry entries to change yout service config for Safe, Gaming, Super Tweak, etc.

DNS Client ~ resolves and caches DNS names and Active Directory domain controller functions. This service is not required for DNS lookups, but if it makes you happy to have it running, you may. However, DNS Client is required if using IPSEC. If you attempt to "repair" your network connection and a dialog box complains that the "DNS resolver failed to flush the cache", this service is the reason. If your computer connects to a network with a domain controller, you will be unable to connect to Active Directory with this service disabled. To reduce network traffic to your ISP's DNS servers, leave this service on automatic.

AtomB · Post by **AtomB** » February 5th, 2003, 12:25 am

yeah i had forgot about they had that article on techtv's site, heck i even watched that show that it was covered on.

yes i agree with checking out blackviper's site if your running xp and would like to kill off some of those un-needed services that are just eating up resources.

wnknisely · Post by **wnknisely** » February 5th, 2003, 6:15 am

lynchknot wrote:This is probably a better idea - but I'm experiencing much faster page rendering

I tried both settings - on Win 2k SP3 I'm getting much faster browsing with DNS cache fully disabled.

It's actually fixed a pretty common problem I had where Phoenix would report that a domain was unreachable, and when I'd hit refresh, I'd go right to the domain.

I wonder if it's a problem with Windows or a problem with Phoenix? I suppose someone running Linux would have to try a similar tweak and see if there's a similar gain.

(I am on a broadband connection for what it's worth. I haven't tried seeing what happens if I drop down to dial-up, but I could imagine that at smaller bandwidth the cache would actually be helpful.)

Post by **alanjstr** » February 5th, 2003, 8:12 am

Also, it will depend on how far your PC has to go for a DNS response. If your ISP is smart, it is caching the information for you. There was an article on Slashdot recently about how much of the traffic at the root servers was unneccessary.

wnknisely · Post by **wnknisely** » February 5th, 2003, 8:51 am

alanjstr wrote:Also, it will depend on how far your PC has to go for a DNS response. If your ISP is smart, it is caching the information for you. There was an article on Slashdot recently about how much of the traffic at the root servers was unneccessary.

I was wondering about that. I move daily between three different networks and connections. Two of the connections are running caching proxies. One - Lehigh University - may or may not be. I'm wondering if the effect that disabling caching has more to do with using the proxy more effectively than it does with anything else.

So far today I've used two of the three networks - the ones that I *know* are caching. Disabling DNS makes a big difference on both networks.

lynchknot · Post by **lynchknot** » February 5th, 2003, 2:56 pm

Well, i've been using the reg entry for several hrs now. It still seems that disabling DNS is much faster.

fingerprint · Post by **fingerprint** » February 5th, 2003, 3:42 pm

With DNS Client disabled in XP Pro I am noticing a dramatic increase in rendering on some pages while it's about the same on others. There are no pages where it is worse. Has anyone noticed any ill effect at all with it disabled? If not I guess I'll keep it this way as it makes it the same or even better on some sites.

Post by **RAF** » February 5th, 2003, 3:45 pm

I dl-ed and clicked the .reg file about 24 hours ago.
To sum it up, I can't tell the difference on DSL.