Portal for gamers: Tweak your DNS settings for faster internet at home

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Portal for gamers: Tweak your DNS settings for faster internet at home

Pete_LeGrant

December 8, 2009

Features, PC, PlayStation 3, Tech, Wii, Xbox 360

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Overview and Caveats

The information in this article could help you speed up your matchmaking online with your video games. (I’m not sure about that. But it can help your internet at home to be faster across the board.) Tweaking your DNS might be a process of trial and error, so be patient.

1. I’m not an expert on this stuff. As a result, there might be holes in my article, and if you have suggestions, I’d love to hear them. I’m just trying to put together a “starter kit” for gamers.

2. It is up to you to make sure that you understand what is involved in tweaking your DNS settings. However, I found the process to change my DNS settings to be very easy, and the result is that I have sped up my internet browsing at home.

3. I’m passing along some links that have info on how to check your DNS (Domain Name Service) settings on your home network, and you might be able to speed up your internet browing and make sure that things are running smoothly on XBOX LIVE, the Playstation Network, the Wii network, and your PC gaming.

4. Make sure that you save the appropriate articles to your computer and write down your existing functional settings. None of this will do you any good if you screw up your settings and then can’t get back online to fix them.

5. Many of the links below are to articles from Lifehacker.com, one of my favorite tech blogs. They inspired this post. So, here’s my usual shout-out to them! Love ya, Lifehacker.com!

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Microsoft’s glossary on networking terms is fairly good:

XBOX LIVE Glossary

According to that glossary, DNS is:

Domain Name Service. An Internet service that translates domain names into Internet Protocol (IP) addresses.

The Internet is based on IP addresses, so every time you use a domain name, a DNS service translates the name into the corresponding IP address. For example, the domain name http://www.example.com/ might translate into http://198.105.232.4/.

See also: PCMag’s original report on Google’s Public DNS, which also gives an overview of what DNS does.

See: HowStuffWorks “How Domain Name Servers Work”
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Diagnostics

Here’s where you really want to start to see whether your DNS settings need to be fixed.

General advice: How to Troubleshoot a Flaky Internet Connection

Start with these links and see whether you need to tweak your DNS settings in the first place:

I downloaded and used Namebench to find out whether my DNS settings were optimal. In my case at home, you can see that there was a huge advantage to switching my DNS setttings. My web browsing is noticeably faster.

Here’s a screengrab of my results from Namebench:

namebench

In my case, I switched the DNS settings on my modem, my XBOX 360 and all of the computers in my home to the recommended settings above. So far, I’m a happier camper.

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