A little computer help needed

[KiwiHopeful]

For the past week or so, I haven't been able to connect to one of my favorite websites:

Boing Boing

I can see that it is still active, since the rss feed is updated several times per day and I can see the updates via Google Reader. However, if I try to click through to the site itself, I cannot connect.

I've tried restarting my modem, clearing the cache, connecting with another machine in the house, but nothing seems to work.

First of all, can any others of you who are here in NZ connect?

If so, then it's me ... and if that is the case, does anyone have any advice about what it could be causing this and how I can resolve it?

Thanks!

[rajrrr]

The problem may be local cache...to remove that download ccleaner(freeware) and use that to clean all temp, cache etc.. hope u r using xp....then go to start->run->type CMD.........u will get DOS window
in that type ipconfig /flushdns

hope u r problem should be solved if it is cache

[KiwiHopeful]

Thanks, but it didn't work.

I think there's a problem in either the router or the modem. I have 3 computers in the house hooked up to the network and none of them can connect to the site.

Sadly, my expertise with home networking only goes so far as to getting it set up and keeping it (mostly) running.

[Pulsarblu]

perhaps a ring to your local ISP to check if they are blocking this site.

Pulsarblu

[Taffy]

Hi KH, the site is still up, for sure. There's a number of tests to do that can help resolve this... are you using XP or Vista?

[KiwiHopeful]

Both my machines run XP.

Just to clarify, I've tried all three computers and both Firefox and IE on all.

I'm also unable to connect to a subdomain at BB:
Boing Boing Gadgets

I can't find anything on the iHug website that would lead me to believe they've blocked the site. I know I can give them a call, but I'd rather not deal with them until absolutely necessary.

[Taffy]

If you open the command prompt Start->Run->cmd

Type: ping www. boingboing. net and press enter (without the spaces in the domain name!!)

If you get all timed out messages, the biggest likelyhood is that you're banned from their server, most likely by your IP address. If this is the case, assuming you have a dynamic IP address, turn your modem off for about 30 minutes, turn it back on and pray you get assigned a new IP, then test the site again. You could make a note of your current IP to see if you do get a new one, to be sure.

If, however, you get successful responses, then we'll move on to the next test!

[KiwiHopeful]

I've been working on this on a couple of fronts and finally have it resolved.

I pinged the IP and just got timeouts.

While we had dinner, I shut down the modem (again), did a hard reset, and that seems to have resolved it. :shrug:

I don't know if it was shutting down (which I had done before) or doing the restart. Whatever it was, I finally got a good IP I guess.

[Taffy]

Sometimes if you just reset a modem you get reallocated the IP address you were just on, as the ISP's service allocates the first IP available in your region. If no one else gets it while your modem reboots, you get the same IP back. Shutting it off for a while usually ensures a new IP.

Try not to get banned again KH, you lowly hacker type!

[KiwiHopeful]

I have to admit to not knowing much (really anything) about how IP addresses work. I can ipconfig -release/-renew and that's about it. They must be allocated by region, right? Would that make ones from this part of the world (no offense intended, Korea) more likely to be 'bad' than in other places? I ask because in my 10+ years of surfin' the net (Mosaic, anyone?) I've never encountered this.