web address

[jbuffett]

I am trying to help out a friend. When he types in the name of a web address he is getting a page cant be found. If he types in the number address then he can get to that site fine. He cant even click on a hyperlink to gain access to a web address. It has to be in number form. Any suggestions.
Thanks
Tom

 

[aquias]

DNS settings...

What are his DNS settings set to? Is he pointed to a specific address to obtain this or is he set to get his DNS settings dynamically? If he has an address setup under DNS, then I'd copy the IP down and remove this setting and see if it resolves the issue.

If this doesn't, then I'd see if he has any web accelerators installed, if he does, remove them and then check his lmhosts.sam file for any entries that may be forcing his traffic to be redirected.

 

[Dollar]

This could be DNS or WINS. It depends on the environment. If he's a homeuser I would say neither.
DNS is qualified by a hosts file
WINS is with lmhosts (lmhosts.sam is not an active file for WINS lookup - no .sam extension)

As a corporate user, most are on DNS so check that his entries for DNS servers are correct:
Right click My Network Places -> Select Properties
Right click Network connection -> Properties (normally called Local Area Connection)
Click TCP/IP and again...Properties
Click DNS tab at the top of the Properties page and ensure he has all the correct settings.
If they use WINS - TCP/IP properties still, but WINS tab - make sure there are entries for WINS servers.
For WINS with LMHOSTS lookup, on the WINS tab make sure "Enable LMHOSTS lookup" is checked. If it is:
goto: c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc
Right click LMHOSTS file and select "Open With..." and use Notepad to open. Make sure there are entries in there for what is required.
For DNS via HOSTS file:
c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc
HOSTS -> Open with Notepad and ensure there are entries here if they use DNS.

Unfortunately, I've not seen this in a home environment.

 

[Zen2Go]

His ISP's DNS servers are down

 

[bcastner]

It is clearly a DNS issue, and as Zen2Go notes, may well be temporary.

I would however suggest that you do a few steps:

. Repair the Winsock service stacks. This is trivial to do, see faq779-4625

. Run IEFIX to make certain there is no DLL registration issue for Hyperlinks:

http://www.mvps.org/sramesh2k/IEFIX.htminterDrivers.htm

. Make sure the HOSTS file has not be played with by malware. It is located in %windir%\system32\drivers\etc and is editable with notepad. It should look like this:

# Copyright (c) 1993-1999 Microsoft Corp.
#
# This is a sample HOSTS file used by Microsoft TCP/IP for Windows.
#
# This file contains the mappings of IP addresses to host names. Each
# entry should be kept on an individual line. The IP address should
# be placed in the first column followed by the corresponding host name.
# The IP address and the host name should be separated by at least one
# space.
#
# Additionally, comments (such as these) may be inserted on individual
# lines or following the machine name denoted by a '#' symbol.
#
# For example:
#
# 102.54.94.97 rhino.acme.com # source server
# 38.25.63.10 x.acme.com # x client host

127.0.0.1 localhost

**** note there should be an empty line after the localhost entry, and the file must have NO extensions such as .txt