Reduced my ping from 57ms to 42ms by changing DNS servers

DonJose · 21-10-2010 05:26PM #1

I thought I'd share the following with you guys. I was browsing to find a good/fast public DNS server and found the following open source program that finds and recommends the best primary and secondary dns server based on your location. Didn't think it would make a difference but when I changed to the programs recommended servers I reduced my speedtest ping from 57ms to 42ms :eek:

Anyway the program is called Namebench and can be downloaded at the following link,

http://code.google.com/p/namebench/

Jumpy · 21-10-2010 05:28PM

DNS has no effect on ping.

A fast DNS server will only speed up your name resolution.

DonJose · 21-10-2010 05:29PM

Jumpy wrote: »

DNS has no effect on ping.

A fast DNS server will only speed up your name resolution.

Well the speedtest went from 57ms to 42ms, so something changed somewhere.

Jumpy · 21-10-2010 05:31PM

That test is based on an average. It is rare you will get the same result twice.

Even pings to boards.ie can vary widely depending on both local and server load.

Jumpy · 21-10-2010 05:34PM

Probably a poor example as I am on a fast connection but...

Pinging loadbalancer.boards.ie [89.234.66.107] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 89.234.66.107: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=60
Reply from 89.234.66.107: bytes=32 time=10ms TTL=60
Reply from 89.234.66.107: bytes=32 time=8ms TTL=60
Reply from 89.234.66.107: bytes=32 time=7ms TTL=60

Ping statistics for 89.234.66.107:
    Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 7ms, Maximum = 10ms, Average = 8ms

watty · 21-10-2010 06:07PM

You'll maybe see the first ping slightly higher time sometimes, nothing to do with DNS. DNS is resolved separately from the ping.
no DNS on each ping. Ping uses the IP.

You get variation anyway...

C:\WINDOWS>ping www.heanet.ie

Pinging samhain.heanet.ie [193.1.219.57] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 193.1.219.57: bytes=32 time=19ms TTL=59
Reply from 193.1.219.57: bytes=32 time=23ms TTL=59
Reply from 193.1.219.57: bytes=32 time=17ms TTL=59
Reply from 193.1.219.57: bytes=32 time=16ms TTL=59

Ping statistics for 193.1.219.57:
    Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 16ms, Maximum = 23ms, Average = 18ms

C:\WINDOWS>ping 193.1.219.57

Pinging 193.1.219.57 with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 193.1.219.57: bytes=32 time=26ms TTL=59
Reply from 193.1.219.57: bytes=32 time=23ms TTL=59
Reply from 193.1.219.57: bytes=32 time=38ms TTL=59
Reply from 193.1.219.57: bytes=32 time=19ms TTL=59

Ping statistics for 193.1.219.57:
    Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
    Minimum = 19ms, Maximum = 38ms, Average = 26ms

You can see 2nd time when I typed IP (thus DNS can't be involved at all, though ARP may be) that ironically the Ping was higher!

watty · 21-10-2010 06:11PM

Jumpy wrote: »

DNS has no effect on ping.

A fast DNS server will only speed up your name resolution.

Poor DNS can affect web page load times it there are iframes and lots of content from different sites, like Adverts.

digme · 27-10-2010 11:37AM

watty wrote: »

Poor DNS can affect web page load times it there are iframes and lots of content from different sites, like Adverts.

also when you visit the page a second time you don't have to make a tcp connection for said images again

Reduced my ping from 57ms to 42ms by changing DNS servers

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