DNS Probe & lack of connectivity

[themanichesingh]

Hey team!

I have TPG’s NBN50 (FTTP) with the TP-Link VX420-G2v modem out in Canberra.

Now, I’ve been having frustrating issues for months now where:

•I can do a web search on DuckDuckGo/Bing etc and get to the results page, but then unable to actually open any results. Sometimes I get the error “DNS_PROBE_FINISHED_NXDOMAIN.”

•Other websites seem to work fine at all times , like ABC news or Facebook (whilst browsing on personal Windows PC).

•Similiarly, Sometimes I cannot access search results or websites by typing in the URL on any of my three phones in my home, or work laptop.
•My PS5 ~ I can do speed tests, however when I try to join online play, I am told I am actually OFFLINE. This seriously adds to my frustrations as now I have to use my personal phone to hotspot to play and hope my data cap for the month isn’t exceeded when I have unlimited NBN at home.

Any suggestions as to what could be causing these issues in between all these different devices? I’m literally typing this out on my phone via 4G since I cannot connect to this site on my laptop using wifi. (Facepalm).

Thanks for any assistance or suggestions in advance.

[david64]

Hi @themanichesingh . Did these issues start with the VX420, or were they happening prior, or did they start after?

You might be getting disconnects to DNS servers. What ones are set in the router?

You could run a continuous ping command on your computer to see if there are any timeouts on the DNS being used in the router.

You can change DNS on computers independently of the router. Wifi devices normally don't have the option to change DNS.

Google DNS is 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4. 

[themanichesingh]

Hey, thanks for the reply!

I’ve only moved into this apartment recently and chose TPG as my provider so cannot say if this VX420 worked previously.

I haven’t changed any DNS SERVER info on the router but I have just logged into it and on the “Network Map” page I see a whole string of numbers under DNS server. Seems to be two sets of numbers starting with 203 for both.

Also - I did the continuous ping tests to google servers and seems to be no packet losses..

Once again I had to look up how to do these tests on my 4G connection since my wifi on VX420 will let me search on Google but not be able to open up any search results. Aforementioned “Probe Error” thing returns -_-

[david64 · Accepted solution]

@themanichesingh . The 2  203 addresses are TPG's DNS.  You could start 2 separate ping windows to those addresses and see what happens when you browse via the VX420.

You can change the properties of the wifi connection in your PC to use Google DNS rather than the default 192.168.1.1, which is the router.

You can make same change in router for the other wifi devices which can't change DNS.

[themanichesingh]

Hey, thank you @david64 for the extremely quick reply!

I have searched your recommended actions up and have now enacted them. I will try it out for a few days and see how I go before posting a result.

Thank you! I hope this is all that's required

[themanichesingh]

Hey, this may be a daft question, but how do I actually change the DNS on the VX420 from TPG's (203) to any other one like Google (so issues with my other devices can be resolved?) Thanks

[david64 · Accepted solution]

@themanichesingh . The VX420 is a bit of a black box since there is no manual for it. It might be similar to the VR1600.

In Network, LAN Settings. Change Primary and Secondary DNS addresses and Save.