Random slowdowns with Google only

[Artagra]

So I have a wierd issue where sometimes resolving a google site takes forever. I open www.google.co.za (or www.google.com), or search for something using the built in Firefox search bar, and about 1 out of every 5 or six times it takes forever to load, or doesn't load at all. Another place where it does it (infact, probably the most frustrating) is in gmail - often it will just get stuck and the only option is to refresh the page, which often means copying the reply it was trying to send and then pasting it again after refinding the email (that is now marked read) - almost makes gmail unusable!

It does this whether I'm in Firefox or Safari (although it happens less often with Safari), and whether I'm using OpenDNS or my ISP's DNS. We are on a 4mb ADSL line, and we don't have issues beyond this with international stuff so I don't think it's the ISP. Any suggestions?

I'm busy trying the Google DNS now, as I figure that might help the problem.

 

[Amida]

I had the same problem at the network I manage at work couldn't figure out what the problem was. Eventually it just went away.

 

[AnomalyNexus]

Had similar resolve-related problems with Google. Went away after a while. Not sure what fixed it, but two things I did roughly around the time it went away is resetting router and upgrading firefox.

 

[Prof.Merlin]

You using Web Africa as your isp?

 

[Defiler]

I am having the exact same problem too, notice it especially when using google picture search, some of the images will not load - have to keep refreshing or some of the pics will just not load at all. Axxess is my isp.

 

[skusku]

Mine happens with gmail, google pictures and google. Same as other guy. First i thought i had virus but i formatted and reinstalled and problem persisted. Using Afrihost with firefox. It happened on win xp for me, but now i am on win 7 and it still happening

 

[Pada]

I think you guys should check to what address its resolving:

from http://forum.mikrotik.com/posting.php?mode=quote&f=2&p=185122

How about the fact that OpenDNS redirects google.com to their own google search servers...

Using bind w/ hints to query root servers directly:

;; ANSWER SECTION:
http://www.google.com. 220388 IN CNAME http://www.l.google.com.
http://www.l.google.com. 292 IN A 64.233.169.103
http://www.l.google.com. 292 IN A 64.233.169.104
http://www.l.google.com. 292 IN A 64.233.169.105
http://www.l.google.com. 292 IN A 64.233.169.106
http://www.l.google.com. 292 IN A 64.233.169.147
http://www.l.google.com. 292 IN A 64.233.169.99


Using OpenDNS servers:

;; ANSWER SECTION:
http://www.google.com. 30 IN CNAME google.navigation.opendns.com.
google.navigation.opendns.com. 30 IN A 208.69.36.230
google.navigation.opendns.com. 30 IN A 208.69.36.231


From the same computer.


Now. Whois results.

whois on 64.233.169.99 returns an IP block owned by google.
whois on 208.69.36.230 returns an IP block owned by opendns.


The TTLs that bind shows are the same as what the Mikrotik shows in the cache for either address. It is just doing what the DNS response is telling it to do.

Its simply OpenDNS hacking stuff. Not a lot you can do about it.

Maybe set the cache size to 0? Lots of cheapy routers dont have any substantial dns cache.

 

[qinglung]

We had the same issue on a few computers, everything would load fast except Google related sites. For us it turned out that Skype was affecting it in some way, still don't understand how, but as soon as Skype was uninstalled, Google went back to normal. I don't know what the other guys did, but I had to install Skype Portable after that. Had no issues since. Other option might be to not install the browser related plugins of Skype, though I haven't tested this. Hope that helps someone.

 

[MrG]

Same thing happens to me at work.. never at home.

@Above Post.. that may make sense actually.