Simple setup..
Cable modem going into a dummy hub(no access to configs)

Both can connect to the outside world.
However... Only one will resolve hosts.

The two machines can ping each other...
But only one can use the isps nameserver.
If I take one off the network the other will work
and vice versa..

Any idea what is going on..

My troubleshooting:::
Replaced hub (so not hardware)
I have two static ip's
my /etc/resolv.conf is correct.
My ipconfigs are correct.

No one is stealing my ip because my ip's are set to the mac addresses per isp.

Any help would be great!

* And further after the dummy hub; how are the other two linux boxes are connected ? (Are your 2 linux boxes have the cable modem to act as its gateway & a nameserver @ both of the box to do the name query, If yes this is the setup, then what class is this nameserver ip is ?
* Is this a boundation or is this your problem ?
* Two static ip's would be of some private lan class.

Does your ISP allow multiple computers to connect at the same time? Most will, but some are funny about that.

What kind of ISP do you have? DSL? Cable? Some ISPs require you to give them the MAC address of the computer you intend to connect to the 'net. This would cause you a real headache if you wanted to connect more than one, unless your router will allow you to do a MAC clone. If so, set it to clone the MAC of one of the computers--it doesn't matter which one--and then restart the router (saving the settings first). Now try to connect with both computers. This is what I had to do with my Comcast cable connection, using a Linksys WRT54G router and its accompaning Linksys cable modem.

Hope that helps.

--Dane

Here was the problem....
The ISP limit on mac addresses at the same time was two.
Well I had three.
Two linux boxes and one win xp machine.
So come to find out that's what the problem was.
case solved.