Selective Internet outage on a Spectrum line
April 23, 2019 7:24 PM Subscribe
I have Spectrum Internet, and for a second time in a month or two most sites are down (notably Google stuff), but some sites still work, albeit slowly (Facebook, and obviously Metafilter). I called the Spectrum tech support line, and they say that there is indeed an outage for my area. I'm curious why some sites work and others don't, and how that makes sense from the ISP side.
It was the same set of sites last time. I've tried across three different devices, so it seems pretty conclusive that the problem isn't on my end, unless there's a problem with my modem / router and the tech is lying (although that seems unlikely).
It was the same set of sites last time. I've tried across three different devices, so it seems pretty conclusive that the problem isn't on my end, unless there's a problem with my modem / router and the tech is lying (although that seems unlikely).
My guess is that they have DNS servers down. DNS servers take the names of the web sites you give them and convert them to IP addresses, much as your GPS takes the more or less abstract info of street names and numbers and converts them into definitive longitude and latitude a nav system can follow.
Because not all of the DNS servers are down, the ones that are still working are still able to turn addresses into IPs and help your computer find what it's looking for. The ones that aren't, don't.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:44 PM on April 23, 2019
Because not all of the DNS servers are down, the ones that are still working are still able to turn addresses into IPs and help your computer find what it's looking for. The ones that aren't, don't.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:44 PM on April 23, 2019
Response by poster: Is there a particular reason that an ISP would lose certain DNS servers for an entire region? It just strikes me as sort of weird, especially since it was the same set of sites last time (although that obviously could just be random / confirmation bias).
posted by codacorolla at 7:51 PM on April 23, 2019
posted by codacorolla at 7:51 PM on April 23, 2019
I am not a tech expert, but you do not have to use your ISP's DNS servers. Can use Google's (8.8.8.8?) for example or 1.1.1.1.
posted by AugustWest at 7:55 PM on April 23, 2019 [2 favorites]
posted by AugustWest at 7:55 PM on April 23, 2019 [2 favorites]
Best answer: It's also possible that DNS is irrelevant, because the ISP is having BGP or gateway issues.
Continuing the GPS analogy, it'd be like if all of the Netflix and Amazon content was in the next town over, and several major roads were flooded. Even though your computer knew exactly where those things were, it could not fetch them because the pathway from here to there was wrong.
Sometimes a "flooded road" is caused by a construction crew physically ripping up a bundle of cables by mistake. Other times there's an unexpected data center power outage, or some equipment breaks. Unfortunately, this is generally not fixable from personal computers relying on the ISP with the issue. Occasionally a VPN can help, but not always.
posted by bagel at 8:15 PM on April 23, 2019 [5 favorites]
Continuing the GPS analogy, it'd be like if all of the Netflix and Amazon content was in the next town over, and several major roads were flooded. Even though your computer knew exactly where those things were, it could not fetch them because the pathway from here to there was wrong.
Sometimes a "flooded road" is caused by a construction crew physically ripping up a bundle of cables by mistake. Other times there's an unexpected data center power outage, or some equipment breaks. Unfortunately, this is generally not fixable from personal computers relying on the ISP with the issue. Occasionally a VPN can help, but not always.
posted by bagel at 8:15 PM on April 23, 2019 [5 favorites]
Response by poster: Thanks - the GPS metaphor is helpful. I do have a VPN, but it refused to connect as well. Both my VPN and Google.etc stuff just came online, so whatever it was apparently just got fixed. I'll keep the DNS fix in mind for next time.
posted by codacorolla at 8:42 PM on April 23, 2019
posted by codacorolla at 8:42 PM on April 23, 2019
Best answer: Different websites can come via different routes to your ISP. This is "peering" between networks, and some might have more problems than others.
posted by nickggully at 9:11 PM on April 23, 2019
posted by nickggully at 9:11 PM on April 23, 2019
Best answer: Yep, a linecard / interface / connection is having issues. Imagine your Spectrum connection goes to into some box that has a dozen different ways to reach different parts of the internet. Probably even over separate boxes. Each box has 4 slots and each slot has 4 connections to different parts of the rest of the world. Somewhere, one little Electrons-to-Light converter is flakey, or one card in one slot is flakey, or one box of cards is flakey, or a backhoe just dug through a place where it shouldn't, or power went down and backup generators didn't work. Peering arrangements may mean that it costs $$ to use this port for these networks, but you could reach those networks via a different port but it's going to cost you $$$$$$.
If you want to have some fun.... make sure you can get to a reputable DNS server and start doing `traceroute` to sites that are up and sites that are down. You can often figure out just which bit is broken.
There's also IPv4 vs IPv6 connectivity (my Spectrum has v6 available...) sometimes those take different paths as well.
The self healing of the Internet is bounded by peering costs. It would cost much more to 'heal' by taking a different route than it would cost to 'fail for a while' during the time it takes to repair the broken bit that's cheaper to run.
posted by zengargoyle at 10:11 PM on April 23, 2019 [1 favorite]
If you want to have some fun.... make sure you can get to a reputable DNS server and start doing `traceroute` to sites that are up and sites that are down. You can often figure out just which bit is broken.
There's also IPv4 vs IPv6 connectivity (my Spectrum has v6 available...) sometimes those take different paths as well.
The self healing of the Internet is bounded by peering costs. It would cost much more to 'heal' by taking a different route than it would cost to 'fail for a while' during the time it takes to repair the broken bit that's cheaper to run.
posted by zengargoyle at 10:11 PM on April 23, 2019 [1 favorite]
The other thing is that Spectrum is generally in a monopoly or sometimes duopoly for broadband, and as such they have very little motivation to spend money to make their services more robust, so they don’t.
posted by rockindata at 3:35 AM on April 24, 2019
posted by rockindata at 3:35 AM on April 24, 2019
Always ask Spectrum for a credit when there's an outage. They're corporate jerks,also, credit.
posted by theora55 at 7:11 AM on April 24, 2019
posted by theora55 at 7:11 AM on April 24, 2019
This thread is closed to new comments.
Vimeo: loads the base page, but won't stream video.
BBC: won't load at all.
czedwards.com: won't load at all.
Wikipedia: won't load at all.
deuceofclubs.com: loads fully.
newsok.com: won't load at all.
...
archive.org: loads fully.
wapo: loads fully.
Other common stuff...
Netflix and Amazon: nope.
Hulu: weirdly, yes, although I can't load video.
posted by codacorolla at 7:29 PM on April 23, 2019