I live in MS and I have Comcast as my ISP. I recently set up an account here to try and make my internet surfing faster. I eventually got everything setup and started surfing and could tell my internet browsing slowed down over 50%

Has anyone else experienced very slow page loading from using OpenDNS?

Thanks!

For me I'm in Thailand. My latency is 317ms and 321ms.I'm using 2Mbps internet. I think I've same problem like rlmccoy1987.

And what were the results for both, OpenDNS and your ISP?

I just set up opendns, and i noticed a slowdown on the first attempt. Restarted double checked everything it is still slower than before?

when i ping:
ping resolver1.opendns.com

it is 8 milliseconds :)

I get a average of around 36ms, 10Mbit Down / 1Mb Up. It hasn't slowed down my browsing, and it's slightly faster for me.

You folk make me jealous:

PING 208.67.222.222 (208.67.222.222) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from 208.67.222.222: icmp_seq=1 ttl=46 time=247 ms
64 bytes from 208.67.222.222: icmp_seq=2 ttl=46 time=311 ms
64 bytes from 208.67.222.222: icmp_seq=3 ttl=46 time=258 ms
64 bytes from 208.67.222.222: icmp_seq=4 ttl=46 time=260 ms
64 bytes from 208.67.222.222: icmp_seq=5 ttl=46 time=262 ms

--- 208.67.222.222 ping statistics ---
5 packets transmitted, 5 received, 0% packet loss, time 4001ms
rtt min/avg/max/mdev = 247.104/268.043/311.222/22.249 ms

PING 208.67.220.220 (208.67.220.220) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from 208.67.220.220: icmp_seq=1 ttl=46 time=260 ms
64 bytes from 208.67.220.220: icmp_seq=2 ttl=46 time=269 ms
64 bytes from 208.67.220.220: icmp_seq=3 ttl=46 time=265 ms
64 bytes from 208.67.220.220: icmp_seq=4 ttl=46 time=261 ms
64 bytes from 208.67.220.220: icmp_seq=5 ttl=46 time=261 ms

--- 208.67.220.220 ping statistics ---
5 packets transmitted, 5 received, 0% packet loss, time 3999ms
rtt min/avg/max/mdev = 260.128/263.482/269.048/3.344 ms

Aren´t you glad you don´t live in my part of the world...

@rlmccoy1987
You wrote: "The ping is around the same as my ISP (comcast) but the page loading 2x faster with my ISP's dns... :-\"

To make it clear: web page loading is technically absolutely nothing to do with DNS. DNS in general or OpenDNS in particular is involved in page loading in no way. The slowdown must have other technical reasons, although it may appear in conjunction with OpenDNS usage.

In your case jack_black147's comment "it's likely a problem with the s/w & h/w comcast uses; they're notorious for bungling most of what they do, and for relatively uneducated staff" seems to me more reasonable.

Just wanted to add, the speed is pretty good in internet explorer (IE) but is extremely slow on firefox... The settings I am using now for firefox run super fast with my ISP's DNS servers but when I use OpenDNS its really slow...

Pinging resolver1.opendns.com [208.67.222.222] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 208.67.222.222: bytes=32 time=256ms TTL=51
Reply from 208.67.222.222: bytes=32 time=254ms TTL=51
Reply from 208.67.222.222: bytes=32 time=256ms TTL=51
Reply from 208.67.222.222: bytes=32 time=257ms TTL=51

Ping statistics for 208.67.222.222:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 254ms, Maximum = 257ms, Average = 255ms

From france :

PING resolver1.opendns.org (208.69.34.132): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 208.69.34.132: icmp_seq=0 ttl=54 time=16.047 ms
64 bytes from 208.69.34.132: icmp_seq=1 ttl=54 time=16.957 ms
64 bytes from 208.69.34.132: icmp_seq=2 ttl=54 time=16.122 ms
64 bytes from 208.69.34.132: icmp_seq=3 ttl=54 time=16.284 ms
64 bytes from 208.69.34.132: icmp_seq=4 ttl=54 time=16.184 ms
64 bytes from 208.69.34.132: icmp_seq=5 ttl=54 time=16.633 ms
64 bytes from 208.69.34.132: icmp_seq=6 ttl=54 time=16.223 ms
64 bytes from 208.69.34.132: icmp_seq=7 ttl=54 time=16.368 ms
64 bytes from 208.69.34.132: icmp_seq=8 ttl=54 time=16.271 ms
--- resolver1.opendns.org ping statistics ---
9 packets transmitted, 9 packets received, 0% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max/stddev = 16.047/16.343/16.957/0.268 ms

Isp dns servers are around 8ms.
Surfing with Opendns seems to be as fast as with Isp dns servers.

As others have said, DNS in general will not cause the page to load slowly. The question that I did not see asked is, does it take forever to resolve the address, or does the slowness occur after the address has been resolved? If it is taking a long time to simply resolve the IP, then there is a chance something is not working as it should with your DNS settings.

The only other way I can see OpenDNS being the cause for the slowdown would be if they are sending you to an alternate IP address for the particular sites you are trying to visit and for whatever reason, that path is slower than the path taken while resolved through a different DNS service (i.e.: Your ISP resolves to an IP of a site to a Chicago data center while OpenDNS resolves to an IP at a London data center). It seems unlikely if the slowness happens with every site visited, but easy to find out by pinging the website while using your ISP's dns and then using OpenDNS's dns.

Ping times have little to do with the speed at which you receive an answer. See the KB article here: http://www.opendns.com/support/article/130

Also remember that if a DNS server is "closer" to you, the end user, its also further away from the authoritative servers it needs to go talk to to get answers. This is why all OpenDNS servers are located in major internet exchange points.

In Indonesia here I get my web pages loaded over 3x faster than my ISP's DNS. I'm currently using a dedicated 100Mbps internet access via fiber optics channel on MacPro using Mac OS X "Leopard" and SAN servers.
Thanks!

Well, I'm also Downunder (in more ways than one!) in Australia.
Since I signed up I can't ping anyone!
Pinging OpenDNS gives a timeout and total packet loss!

Have no idea what I'm doing really, though! :-)

Hi,

From Burgos, Spain:

My ISP:

PING 80.58.0.33 (80.58.0.33) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from 80.58.0.33: icmp_seq=1 ttl=125 time=70.1 ms
64 bytes from 80.58.0.33: icmp_seq=2 ttl=125 time=71.9 ms
64 bytes from 80.58.0.33: icmp_seq=3 ttl=125 time=68.4 ms
64 bytes from 80.58.0.33: icmp_seq=4 ttl=125 time=72.3 ms
64 bytes from 80.58.0.33: icmp_seq=5 ttl=125 time=72.9 ms
64 bytes from 80.58.0.33: icmp_seq=6 ttl=125 time=68.4 ms

PING 80.58.61.250 (80.58.61.250) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from 80.58.61.250: icmp_seq=1 ttl=125 time=82.3 ms
64 bytes from 80.58.61.250: icmp_seq=2 ttl=125 time=76.1 ms
64 bytes from 80.58.61.250: icmp_seq=3 ttl=125 time=76.5 ms
64 bytes from 80.58.61.250: icmp_seq=4 ttl=125 time=77.2 ms
64 bytes from 80.58.61.250: icmp_seq=5 ttl=125 time=77.2 ms

dig @80.58.0.33 google.com |grep "Query time"
;; Query time: 74 msec


OPENDNS:

PING resolver1.opendns.com (208.67.222.222) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from resolver1.opendns.com (208.67.222.222): icmp_seq=1 ttl=55 time=117 ms
64 bytes from resolver1.opendns.com (208.67.222.222): icmp_seq=2 ttl=55 time=105 ms
64 bytes from resolver1.opendns.com (208.67.222.222): icmp_seq=3 ttl=55 time=115 ms
64 bytes from resolver1.opendns.com (208.67.222.222): icmp_seq=4 ttl=55 time=111 ms

dig @208.67.222.222 google.com |grep "Query time"
;; Query time: 109 msec

PING resolver2.opendns.com (208.67.220.220) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from resolver2.opendns.com (208.67.220.220): icmp_seq=1 ttl=55 time=108 ms
64 bytes from resolver2.opendns.com (208.67.220.220): icmp_seq=2 ttl=55 time=103 ms
64 bytes from resolver2.opendns.com (208.67.220.220): icmp_seq=3 ttl=55 time=102 ms
64 bytes from resolver2.opendns.com (208.67.220.220): icmp_seq=4 ttl=55 time=107 ms

dig @208.67.220.220 google.com |grep "Query time"
;; Query time: 110 msec

Hi,

Small difference if I use typical adsl lines, but if I use our lmds simetrycal lines, ping to our ISP dns server is about 45-50 ms and opendns 100ms.

Opendns is a wonderfull service, but I think... is neccesary more dns servers in Europe to reduce time

@az000001:

from our chicago datacenter, i can hit your DSLAM (what your DSL modem connects to) in 40ms.
from our seattle datacenter, i can hit your DSLAM in 68ms.
from our palo alto datacenter, i can hit your DSLAM in 48ms.

from our offices here in California to our servers in NYC, the www.google.com query takes me:
;; Query time: 87 msec

assuming you were plugged into the same network that our servers are, responding to the answer to "www.google.com" takes anywhere between 15ms and 30ms, +/- 5ms. there's some variation there. networks aren't static creatures and capacity between networks ebbs and flows. your findings may be different at 2pm and 2am.

so even a cross-country query goes as quick for me as your Colorado to (?) query. what i'm trying to say here is that your DSL itself is adding quite a bit of latency to your connection, so before you say things like "44% slower" you need to do a host of things to make that number statistically meaningful: factor out the baseline latency, use queries that are in neither system's cache, do queries that are in both system's cache, test from multiple locations, repeat the test enough times to be sure that your numbers aren't anomalous. back of the napkin calculations are fine, but that's all they are.

it's entirely possible that qwest is taking some contrived route to our system (include a traceroute), that there is congestion between qwest and our ISPs (use MTR for your traceroute), or any number of possibilities. of course, the performance that matters to any given user is what occurs for them. if you provide us with data on slow responses, we'll do our best to track it down and if possible, correct any problems.

@everyone else:
www.google.com isn't the greatest test example to use. it'll always be in every DNS server's cache. this just tests round trip time. our servers are used plenty and in most cases have a larger and more vast cache than ISP's DNS servers. some ISPs are pretty big themselves and they may have just as many resources dedicated to DNS as we do. however, OpenDNS in addition to the speed enhancements also has phishing protection, optional blocked domains, preventions against cache poisoning, and other features that ISPs traditionally don't. if you think that an extra few milliseconds to resolve a DNS query is having a noticeable impact in your Internet experience, you may want to consider the many other factors that come into play.

also remember what the others in this thread and elsewhere have said:
* how long does it take your ISP to resolve a domain that ISN'T in their cache?

* how frequently does your ISP's DNS servers go down or experience capacity issues? if one of our datacenters goes down, the other five pick up the slack seamlessly.

* if you're a mobile user, are your ISP's DNS servers just as fast when you're at home, the office, across the country, across the world?

* if your ISP's DNS server is close to you, it may not be close to the other servers it has to talk to to get answers.

* you can always use a local caching name server combined with OpenDNS to get the best of both worlds. your frequently looked up domains will be cached locally, you'll still get all the benefits of OpenDNS. google.com will even resolve in the 1ms to 3ms range, if that's all that matters.

* powerboost, caching proxies, etc all have precious little to do with anything that OpenDNS does with your system. they interact, they can be tuned, but OpenDNS isn't going to slow down your downloads, make you a low/high ping on a game server, or make your connection lossy. it just doesn't work like that.

* DNS systems that send you to a geographically targeted webserver tend to work better with us than many other systems. consider this: your ISP's DNS servers are in Washington DC, you are in California. the geo-targeted system will think you are in Washington DC, because that's where the final DNS request came from. because our servers are distributed and you use the closest one, the geo-targeting systems will know you're in California (or close to it). some distributed systems get this right, some don't.

finally, ISPs do a lot of things. DNS is often one of them. some do it right, some do it decent, some just set it up and leave it alone. i'm not here to judge or rank ISPs. what i can say is that DNS is all we do. it's all we think about. our engineers dream in DNS queries. we're not going to sell you DSL, but we are going to continue to give you the best possible performance, security, and stability that can be achieved.

so, "OpenDNS slowed my surfing down over 50%"? please quantify that meaningfully.

<a href="http://speedtest.dslreports.com"><img border=0 src="http://www.dslreports.com/im/55960061/86052.png"></a>
UsingOpenDNS

about 11 ms for me!

mickytek,

You still aren't grasping that OpenDNS is not slowing your bandwidth. It is impossible for them to throttle your bandwidth down. Their claims on surfing faster is based on the fast response times of their DNS vs other DNS.

If your bandwidth is getting throttled by your ISP for using another DNS service, then your ISP is at fault.

@mnordhoff
Your assumption seems to point into the right direction. I also got this suspicion after working with this thread: http://forums.opendns.com/comments.php?DiscussionID=1887
where a Norwegian is (re)directed to the New York/USA OpenDNS server instead of London/GB. And their NYC server naturally returns USA IP addresses for popular sites instead of their European pendants, unless they use Anycast or CDN, which could then correct the effect, or even not.

@deadcyclo
It would have been very useful not just grepping the query times, but also the IP addresses returned, i.e. if your local DNS server returns the same IP addresses as OpenDNS, or different ones. This could add to my theory explained in my previous contribution above.
However, in case of these domains I would not really expect different IP addresses, as the mentioned sites may have only one server and IP address.

Yes, confirmed, for me it looks fine. Thanks for your efforts.

Solve for OpenDNS . make servers on other continents - EUROPE. ASIA AFRICA AUSTRALIA...... we all connecting to the USA as i know = big ping