How To: Increase DNS Cache In Windows Vista For Faster Web Browsing
About Windows DNS Cache:
Windows uses a cache called DNS cache to store recently visited websites ie,Windows operating system puts the DNS information into a local DNS cache on your PC when you visit a site. You can see what your computer stores in this cache by going to Windows Vista Start > Run and typing cmd (the command prompt). Now type ipconfig/displaydns. You should see a list of all the website addresses it has stored in the cache.
Working of Windows DNS Cache:
Whenever you go to a website, it has to look up the IP address where that website is located. First it checks to see if it’s in your cache before asking the DNS server over the Internet for the IP address.The cache contains both negative and positive entries. Positive entries are those in which the DNS lookup succeeded and you were able to connect to the Web site. When Windows looks in the cache, if it finds a positive entry, it immediately uses that DNS information and sends you to the requested Web site. As you can see, referring to the address when you already have it is going to be faster than if it has to travel over the wires to retrieve it.
Negative entries are those in which no match was found, and you end up getting a “Cannot find server or DNS” error in your browser. Similarly, when Windows looks in the cache and finds a negative entry, it gives you the error message without bothering to go out to the site.Negative entries can lead to problems. When you try to make a connection to a site that has a negative entry in your cache, you’ll get an error message, even if the site’s problems have been resolved and it’s now reachable.
The items in the cache do not stay there forever, and are constantly making room for more recent addresses you visited. Increasing the size of the DNS cache in Windows Vista will allow for faster web browsing, especially if you frequently view the same websites. Edit some registry values to achieve this.
- Click Start, type regedit in the Windows Vista Start search box, and then press ENTER.
- Locate and then expand the following registry subkey:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Dnscache\Parameters
- Go to New > DWORD (32-bit) Value.
- Name it as CacheHashTableBucketSize
- Double-click into it and enter the value 1
- Also create the following DWORD values with the following values:
NegativeCacheTime = 0
CacheHashTableSize = 384
MaxCacheEntryTtlLimit = 64000
MaxSOACacheEntryTtlLimit = 301
- Close the Windows Vista registry editor window and restart your computer for the changes.
Note: To make the change take effect flush your Windows DNS cache by issuing the command ipconfig /flushdns at an elevated command prompt. The command will flush your DNS cache — all the entries, both positive and negative, will be flushed — and it will be empty until you start visiting Web sites. Negative entries, however, will not be added to the cache if you’ve given the DWORD a value of 0.
Warning: Modifying the Windows registry can cause serious damage to your Windows Operating System.It is better to backup your Windows registry data before making any changes. Tomstricks.com is not responsible for any changes you may make to your system.
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Written by Tony on April 22nd, 2009 with
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