The facts. We receive our broad band from BT. We can connect with any site we want. But my wife is trying to access the site of the International Journal of Infection Control. Do a google search, click on the site, and it says "server not found" (we tried with my Mac, and her PC with Windows 7, and using Safari, Explorer, Modzilla). But colleagues of her in Malta, USA, Canada and Norway have no problems accessing the site. A friend in Ipswich, that does not receive its Internet from BT, can access the site without a problem. But another friend who has BT as provider, and lives at about 5 miles from us (same exchange?), can't access it, the same "no server found" message the result.
Of course we talked to BT (at great length..!), and the advisor, who is in India, can access the site without any problems (we did all the unplugging and restarting that they suggested, but the friend 5 miles away is the control experiment: it is not our system at home that is at fault). BT has no answer, they say that the local exchange cannot interfere with a site in this manner. They have been very good, very patient, they just cannot understand it.
Two things. 1- Any ideas?
2.- Can anyone of you that lives in the UK far from Attleborough (a town south of Norwich) and receives broadband from BT, try accessing the site and see if the problem is local BT or BT everywhere?
Many thanks for your patience and help
Donald Richards (ernesto17)
http://www.ijic.info/index works fine on BT here in deepest, darkest Gloucestershire.
No problem here using Virgin Media in South Devon!
If you've got a Mac, try changing the DNS settings in SysPrefs > Network to 8.8.4.4
Fails here in East Northamptonshire on BT Broadband, but I get "Page cannot be displayed" I'm on BT Infinity, could it be different between Infinity and normal ADSL? If I do a tracert ijic.info in the command prompt it says unable to resolve host system?
Hope that helps somehow!
OK here with TalkTalk and Firefox. (Scotland)
'Server not found' here in north Worcestershire, BT Infinity 1, Firefox
'Page can't be displayed' in IE
Tony
Many thanks to all of you that took the trouble to check.
Seems to be a BT problem, but not everywhere in the country. And it is not BT infinity, our friends close to home are not subscribed to it, and we are.
It may remain a mystery. but an interesting one.
Again, many thanks to all that replied.
Regards
Donald Richards (ernesto17)
Not that much of a mystery, I'm sure you'll find it's a DNS error at BT, BT use many DNS servers (it's like a phone book for web addresses) and the DNS server you're using has a 'phone book page' missing!
As I've already mentioned, if you change the DNS setting on your Mac to 8.8.4.4 you'll be using a Google DNS not a BT one - that should sort it.
I am a bit (enormous understatement here) ignorant in these matters. You seem to be able to connect to the page, using BT. I assumed that this DNS was a BT choice, but it seems that it is each computer that determines what DNS to use. Is this right? If that is so, I should change the DNS in my Mac and in my wife's PC?
Many thanks
Donald Richards (ernesto17)
It is probably a temporary issue with the specific BT DNS server you are using through your hub (Your DNS is set here) - With a Mac it's very easy to use a 'temporary" DNS server by adding 8.8.4.4 to the DNS settings in the Mac network settings under System Prefs. When BT get it sorted you can delete the settings on your Mac.
Look for the paragraph "How to Change the DNS Servers on a Mac"
Much clearer now! Many thanks for all the help.
If you want to get adventurous, try Namebench from Google, it'll query all the DNS nameservers from your bookmarks and show you which is the fastest for you, I've been using Google (8.8.4.4), just ran Namebench and it's told me OpenDNS is 11% faster for me.
Changed to 8.8.4.4 and now I can connect to the site. Many thanks!
