I have a German Windows, so some words below will be in German, sorry.
I have just updated Windows 8 to 8.1 and there was a problem with Internet connection. My Firefox has refused to connect to most of Websites. I have traced the problem to connection-specific DNS suffix. ipconfig has shown that on Windows 8.1 strangely enough this suffix was equal to Speedport_W_303V_Typ_B (this is my WiFi DSL connection). As a result, the name resolution was as follows:
$ nslookup www.microsoft.com
Server: speedport.ip
Address: 192.168.2.1
Nicht autorisierende Antwort:
NS request timed out.
timeout was 2 seconds.
Name: www.microsoft.com.Speedport_W_303V_Typ_B
Addresses: 62.157.140.133
80.156.86.78
I do not know what these two IP-addresses are, but they are not related to www.microsoft.com. Hence the problem was the name resolution. I have found this funny, as Microsoft has disabled the right resolution even of its own name. The message in Firefox looked nice: Server not found, Firefox can't find the server at www.microsoft.com. This happened after the update that I have made through Internet!
One quick solution was to use the point at the end of the name:
$ nslookup www.microsoft.com.
Server: speedport.ip
Address: 192.168.2.1
Nicht autorisierende Antwort:
DNS request timed out.
timeout was 2 seconds.
Name: lb1.www.ms.akadns.net
Address: 64.4.11.42
Aliases: www.microsoft.com
toggle.www.ms.akadns.net
g.www.ms.akadns.net
The point at the end means that the DNS name is complete, as the point is the name of the uppermost domain. Yet, such a solution was clearly not an ideal one.
After some trials and error I have found the settings that have allowed me to remove this nonsense.
1) Systemsteuerung\Alle Systemsteuerungselemente\Netzwerk- und Freigabecenter
2) Adaptereinstellungen ändern
3) Right click the WiFi connection and choose Properties
4) TCP/IPv4 Properties
5) Erweitert | DNS | Choose Diese DNS-Suffixe anhängen and add “.” as the DNS suffix. Also put “.” in DNS-Suffix für diese Verbindung.
6) Check with ipconfig that now the connection-specific DNS suffix is equal to “.”
That’s it. Now it is working as in Windows 8.
Well, some time ago I used to teach administrating of Windows and I was able to solve that problem. Yet, it remains to me as a puzzle how normal people can work on Windows.
run command prompt as administrator
type: netsh winsock reset and hit ENTER
restart pc / laptop
and your connection problems are past
Thank you. I do not remember now what I have tried then.