You're zooming down the information superhighway getting things done when your usually-trusty browser throws up the dreaded "Server not found" message. Argh! Now what? Though there are several reasons why your internet connection is lost, your internet service provider DNS server could simply be unreachable.
Thankfully there are alternative FREE DNS servers that can be used to access the Internet. If you are a Comcast user, you can use either Google DNS or OpenDNS. Just change your DNS server IP address to 8.8.8.8 to use Google DNS or change it to 208.67.220.220 to use OpenDNS. Your Internet should start working again.
For the less technical:
Domain Name Service (DNS) is the thingy that translates names like cprhi.com into these other things called Internet Protocol Addresses such as 72.249.106.68. Without DNS, we have to remember every thing by numeric IP address.
For a step-by-step guide on how to change your DNS, read on below:
1. Open your Control Panel.
2. Click on the Network and Sharing Center icon.
3. Find the name of the network you're connected to, and then click on View status.
4. In the Networking tab click on Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4) and then click Properties on the bottom-right corner.
5. Select "Use the following DNS server addresses:" and enter in the following:
Preferred DNS server: 8.8.8.8
Alternate DNS server: 8.8.4.4
6. Click OK. Open your web browser, and your Internet should start working now.
You can stay with the Google DNS servers or you can switch back to Comcast's DNS servers by following steps 1-4, and in step 5 switching back to "Obtain DNS server address automatically".
