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Open DNS is s***ware

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Fred Nerd:
I read one article on www.ask-leo.com and it advocated Open DNS for security reasons. So I decided to try it out. I can't say I noticed any performance increase of any kind, but what happened was that
a: when it couldn't go to the sitein the address bar, it would gi to its own search page. Prick.
b: it wouldn't play the streaming music on MySpace. It stopped at about 13 secs (luckily I'm not superstitious).

So I scrapped it,and all is good now.

I also found out that Google Web accelerator blocks Myspace Mp3 Gopher, but since I shouldn't be using it anyway, I won't boast about it.

It works now.

So be careful with Open DNS, and GWA, neither of them did any noticeable good, and a bit of bad.....

40hz:
I use OpenDNS on all my home and business machines, along with most of my client's, and I haven't had that experience.

One thing that may be creating a problem for you is that OpenDNS requires you to include "dot something" when you enter a URL. Example: If you just enter google you'll get the OpenDNS search page. If you enter google.com then you will go directly to the Google homepage. And yes, this was done for security reasons.

Firefox defaults to dot-com if you don't include it. Many popular sites (Project Gutenberg, etc.) are not dot-coms. And a lot of people who are up to no good know that. By requiring you to explicitly enter the top-level domain name you won't be inadvertently sent to the wrong site with possible bad consequences.

As far as performance goes, I haven't noticed a huge boost in browsing speed. But OpenDNS is more responsive than the nameservers my ISP (AT&T) provides. I actually use OpenDNS as my primary and secondary DNS - and AT&T's as my tertiary just in case OpenDNS is unreachable. That way I'm pretty much guaranteed access to a nameserver no matter what is going on.

Can't comment on your issues with MySpace since I don't go there if I can possibly avoid it. Not knocking it. It's just not my thing. :)

Cheers!

f0dder:
I'd rather set up my own caching nameserver than using OpenDNS - but fortunately, my ISP DNS works pretty well.

Only time I've ever used OpenDNS is when other people have had DNS-related trouble. I don't really like the idea of their search page crap, it should just return no IP for the domain request. Filtering DNS records to protect against malware sites is an okayish idea, but Quis custodiet ipsos custodes??

kartal:
To be honest, I have checked their privacy policy and it is no different than google`s privacy policy in that matter. Do not be fooled with "open" in the name.  I actually tried and did not see any notice in speed or performance as well. By subscribing a dns server like that, you are letting them to know everything about your online behaviour and their privacy policy is not convincing. I know that privacy is very overlooked thing when it comes to online services. But seriously privacy is the biggest most important item in the future of technology and net which in return will affect the democracies of our societies. I just hope that companies-institutions will be hold more accountable and individuals will get smarter about their desicions.

Try installing privoxy for ad filtering, it works very well. For faster dns responses you can also try putting your isp`s direct dns adresses in your network settings.

Edvard:
I use OpenDNS for a few reasons:
1- Speed. I am still on dial-up at home, so squeezing every ounce of speed out of my 33.6 connection is vital. OpenDNS servers are 5x faster than the ISP's. Why dial-up? It's free and I just cannot squeeze an extra 30-50 bucks out of my paycheck for decent high speed access.
2- Filtering. Bandwidth being precious, I block as many ads as I can. I understand people still need to make money and ad revenue runs quite a bit of the internet, but when the ads load before the content, I get a little testy...

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