How do I flush DNS?

04 Sep 2010

Support Center » Knowledgebase » How do I flush DNS?

	How do I flush DNS?

Solution Most DNS clients cache the results of name resolution requests. This speeds up name resolution if multiple lookups are done to the same address, such as is common when browsing the web.

C:\>ipconfig /flushdns

Windows IP Configuration

Successfully flushed the DNS Resolver Cache.

You can also use the command ipconfig /displaydns to view the DNS resolver cache.

Turning off DNS Caching under Microsoft Windows
================================

If you experience frequent issues with DNS caching under Microsoft Windows, you can disable client-side DNS caching with either of these two commands:

* net stop dnscache
* sc servername stop dnscache

This will disable DNS caching until the next reboot. To make the change permanent, use the Service Controller tool or the Services tool to set the DNS Client service startup type to Disabled.

Tuning on DNS Caching under Microsoft Windows
===============================

You can modify the behavior of the Microsoft Windows DNS caching algorithm by setting two registry entries in the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Dnscache\Parameters registry key.

The MaxCacheTtl represents the maximum time that the results of a DNS lookup will be cached. The default value is 86,400 seconds. If you set this value to 1, DNS entries will only be cashed for a single second.

MaxNegativeCacheTtl represents the maximim time that the results of a failed DNS lookup will be cached. The default value is 900 seconds. If you set this value to 0, failed DNS lookups will not be cached.

How to Flush DNS in Mac OSX
===================

In Mac OSX Leopard, you can use the command dnscacheutil -flushcache to flush the DNS resolver cache:

bash-2.05a$ dnscacheutil -flushcache

In Mac OSX versions 10.5.1 and before, the command lookupd -flushcache performed the same task:

bash-2.05a$ lookupd -flushcache

How to Flush DNS in Linux
=================

In Linux, the nscd daemon manages the DNS cache.

To flush the DNS cache, restart the nscd daemon.

To restart the nscd daemon, use the command `/etc/init.d/nscd restart`.

Article Details

Article ID:

Created On:

28 Aug 2008 10:23 AM