IP and DNS question

[nitro237]

OK, I wanted to give my laptop and my wife's laptop static ip's to make it easier for port forwarding some apps. I went in and assigned each laptop an ip address and assigned it to use a local internet providers DNS server. It seems to be working fine.

My question is, do you have to tell it to use certain DNS when you assign static ip or could I have continued to let it get it automatically, even though I assigned it a static ip ?

Should I have done it differently ?

[TheSovereign]

when within a corporate network its best to use the domain servers as dns servers because they can also list the location of any other servers within the network. at home you can use any open dns server you wish. they all do the same thing. just make sure that the ip is internet accessable. to ensure this make sure your ip (if internal) is the same block that the router is using and is using the router as a gateway. if your ip is externel make sure your isp has provisioned it for use and also uses the correct gateway

[FlyingPenguin]

The simplest way to setup static IPs on home computers using a home gateway type router is to specify the address of the router as the DNS server.

So for instance if your router is 192.168.1.1 then your DNS and gateway on each PC should be set to 192.168.1.1 The router itself automatically acquires the DNS servers from your IP, and then it acts as a local DNS relay for all your PCs.

While you can also do what you did, specifically entering the DNS servers on each computer, and it will work fine, it's a little more elegant to just point them at the router. That way if you ever need to change the DNS servers you just change it at the router and then all the PCs will use the new DNS server.

You may not want to use your ISP's DNS server and use OpenDNS instead. Most ISPs treat their DNS servers as bastard children. Their DNS servers are usually poorly maintained and overloaded (Comcast is notorious for slow DNS servers). You can get a lot better performance by using a fast DNS server like OpenDNS and as a bonus OpenDNS also blocks phishing sites for you.

I started using OpenDNS 8 months ago because I have get very inconsistent performance from Comcast and I'm very happy with it.

OpenDNS DNS server IPs are:
208.67.222.222 and 208.67.220.220
Just plug those in instead of your IP's DNS servers. I bet you'll see an improvement.

[nitro237]

ok, I will try the open dns servers.

So let me get this straight, if you go into internet protocols and assign a ststic ip, you do have specify a dns server there also. You can't specify an ip address and leave "obtain DNS server automatically" . ?

[FlyingPenguin]

No, if you assign a static IP you have to assign at least one DNS server. Like I said, usually you use the IP of the router and let the router handle DNS as a relay. Then if you want to use OpenDNS then you need to specify the DNS servers in the router's setup page but since it's only two computers you can also just enter the two OpenDNS IPs manually as the DNS for each computer. Up to you.

[nitro237]

Got it. Thanks again mile