Both my wife and I are experiencing problems getting webpages to come up, even though the connections seem to be strong and dns seems to be working. Hers is rhel 5, mine fedora 10, and our windows machines work just fine. All connections are wireless.

So I checked /etc/resolv.conf and we both have nameservers listed. Then I did some traceroutes to some of my favorite sites. For a few sites, the traceroute terminated successfully, but for others it would stop at an ip with something like an !N or !X message. Of course, the successful traceroutes were the only webpages I could view, and they tended to be websites that were local to my area. Just to be sure, I unplugged and power cycled my wireless router, but the same behavior ensued.

My conclusion: Work is being done to the network somewhere, and we just need to wait.

What I don't get is that the windows machines are working fine, and even after I clear the cache, it brings up new pages quickly. It seems unlikely that we would both get linux network problems at the same time, so I think the problem must be with the dns server, or dhcp offers from our router. I did a traceroute to the dns server, and it ended successfully, so I am out of ideas. Any help or comments would be appreciated.

Having nameservers listed in resolv.conf is no guarantee that name resolution is working. Try using nslookup to test name resolution, for example

Thanks Catkin,

nslookup seems to be giving ips:

[chase@laptop ~] nslookup linuxquestions.org
Server: 192.168.0.1
Address: 192.168.0.1#53

Non-authoritative answer:
Name: linuxquestions.org
Address: 75.126.162.205

Traceroute to this ip terminates successfully.

Typing the ip directly into firefox, it is immediately replaced in the address bar by www.linuxquestions.org, the page title loads, but the browser remains blank white with "Read www.linuxquestions.org" at the bottom.

try some other browser (konqueror/opera).
Check if you are using any proxy and if your proxy settings are correct or not.
then check your gateway (route -n).
(You can compare the above two with the corresponding settings of your windows machine)
Also, was it working earlier? If yes when/on doing what did it stop working?

hi sarin,

I tried seamonkey and google chrome with no success. As far as proxy settings go, on the windows side firefox, it is set as "no proxy" (under tools -> options). On Fedora, under Preferences > Internet and Network > Network Proxy, it is configured for direct internet connection, and firefox is set for no proxy as well.

It was working fine before, and I didn't update anything or make any system changes before. What should I check for with route -n?

Have you tried reviewing mtu size for you network?

With route -n you will see something like...

The last one which starts with 0.0.0.0 is your default gateway. From your first post, I am guessing that it will be 192.168.0.1. You can check this against your windows machine's default gw.

You can also try what previous poster suggested. You can change mtu setting by "ifconfig eth0 mtu 400" (replace eth0 with the name of your wireless device)

May be checking the settings at your gateway might help. Check if it has some firewall/access settings etc which you might have turned on accidentally. That device should mostly have a webpage where you can check this. You can also check if there is any firewall rule on Linux machines. Use "iptables -F" to flush all rules if in doubt.

You can use wireshark to check this issue. But, it might not be that simple. Try the following:

telnet www.google.com 80
Trying 209.85.231.104...
Connected to www.google.com.
Escape character is '^]'.
GET / HTTP/1.0 (Press enter 2 times after this)

If you are stuck at "Trying 209.85.231.104..." you mostly have a routing issue.
Also, I hope you don't have any ip conflicts in your lan.

Perhaps the http port is firewalled. Try Use Ctrl+C to break out of it.

Well, I called my isp, and without mentioning the linux networking problem, they recommended a firmware upgrade for the wireless gateway (Actiontec wireless gateway 701wg-something or other). I ran the upgrade and it seems to have solved the problem. Thanks for your comments and advice.