Adelphia/Comcast->Time Warner check thisFollow

For diggers: http://digg.com/gaming_news/Japanese_Servers_stop_working_after_TW_acquires_Adelphia

Digg it to be heard!!!


For those who are not able to connect to the POL.exe or to playonline.com and are Adelphia/Comcast-> Time Warner please read this:

I personally made a call to Timewarner's support line. Since I am an Adelphia customer, I called 1-866-668-6044 to put a complaint.

o Bypass their tier 1 customer service level by mentioning it is a DNS issue. Inform the Tier 1 Customer service rep that the issue is beyond basic web browsing and a problem with a specific site that exclusively effects Adelphia users

o You will be given a workorder and transferred up

o Give the TIer 2 your work order to proceed with the call

o Tier 2 will give you information that this is a known issue and one of the engineers on Adelphia/TW's end has called Playonline and they determined it is a routing issue. This information is false. Networking doesn't work like that:
- Inform him that the service for both the website and FFXI works for Verizon (#1 competitor) users
- Switching DNS server on your router to Verizon's DNS servers of 4.2.2.1 and 4.2.2.3 works perfectly fine for viewing the website, but you are unable to access FFXI via POL

o They will note that if DNS doesn't work with Verizon after you switched it, then this is a Verizon issue. Inform them then why does the website work with Verizon's DNS but not Adelphia/TW's? This will put them on their back heels because their is no explaination of why the site works but not the game.

o The tier2 will reply back that this is a routing issue on POL's side and that not all traffic is being redirected. This is FALSE no information on the back end will be scoped out for just us, and if that is the case then the Engineer's with POL would have to call up to request that this be fixed.

IMPORTANT PART
o Request that they put the call up to their higher level network engineer's of a problem in accessing both gaming features and the website with Adelphia/TW"s DNS server information. If they reject this saying that it is a known issue on POL's end, demand that they put it up anyways.

o Key is in numbers. Technical support on upper level end will notice and issue if MORE PEOPLE REPORT. Trust me on this, don't take no for an answer.



Technical information regarding how to test Verizon's DNS and confirm that POL doens't work but http://www.playonline.com does:

o To check your configuration of your network:
- Click on Start > Run > type in without quotes "cmd" > click ENTER
- Type in without quotes "ipconfig /all" > hit the Enter key on your keyboard.
- Look at the DNS field. It should show up for Adelphia users: 68.168.64.21 and 68.168.64.22

How to Ping:
- From the CMD prompt mentioned previously, type out without quotes "ping playonline.com" > hit Enter you will get back a

C:\Documents and Settings\User>ping playonline.com
Ping request could not find host playonline.com. Please check the name and try a
gain.

- This will occur with Both Verizon's and Adelphia/TW's DNS. I can't explain this. However, someone pointed out in a different thread that the IP for playonline.com is 43.253.131.24

- Ping results fail from both DNS. Proof comes from NSLOOKUP

-Here is an NSLOOKUP of playonline.com from Adelphia's DNS

C:\Documents and Settings\user>nslookup playonline.com
Server: dnscache7.cdptpa.adelphia.net
Address: 68.168.64.21

DNS request timed out.
timeout was 2 seconds.
*** Request to dnscache7.cdptpa.adelphia.net timed-out

-Here is a NSLOOKUP of playonline.com from Verizon's DNS


C:\Documents and Settings\User>nslookup playonline.com
Server: vnsc-pri.sys.gtei.net
Address: 4.2.2.1

Name: playonline.com

Conclusion to NSLOOKUP info: Verizon's DNS is not allowing non-Verizon user's all features of thier DNS services. Other DNS server information from different ISP's be appreciated.


How to change DNS from Windows XP for non-router users:
-Start Control Panel (or Settings then Control Panel) > Network Connections.
* If you see Network and Internet Options, then click on that
* You will then click on Network Connections
- Locate your connection to the internet. It might be either LAN or wireless
- Right click on it and go to Properties
- Double click on Internet Protocol (TCP/IP)
- Your default settings will be set to "Use the following DNS servers"
* If you want to change this information to test Verizon's DNS, enter the two DNS servers spaced out accordingly with the Dots with 4.2.2.1 and 4.2.2.3
* Click OK > click OK

How to change your DNS for your router
- First identify your gateway's IP by going to Start > Run > type in without quotes "CMD" > click OK
- Type out without quotes "ipconfig /all"
- Identify the gateway server. Most likely will be 192.168.1.1 or can slightly be different
- In your web browser, type in the Gateway's IP address and when prompted for username and password enter without quotes "admin" (works for Linksys routers, may not work for all other brands)
- At the first screen will be your DNS servers. Enter the the correct IPs of 4.2.2.1 and 4.2.2.3 to change it to Verizon's for testing.
- To return back the settings change them to 0.0.0.0

***********Update***********
I made a big oversight that would really helped me prove my case with the customer support. I forgot "www" before playonline.com

With Adelphia's DNS server information:
C:\Documents and Settings\user>nslookup www.playonline.com
Server: dnscache7.cdptpa.adelphia.net
Address: 68.168.64.21

DNS request timed out.
timeout was 2 seconds.
*** Request to dnscache7.cdptpa.adelphia.net timed-out

C:\Documents and Settings\user>ping www.playonline.com
Ping request could not find host www.playonline.com. Please check the name and t
ry again.


With Verizon's server information:
C:\Documents and Settings\user>nslookup www.playonline.com
Server: vnsc-pri.sys.gtei.net
Address: 4.2.2.1

Non-authoritative answer:
Name: www.playonline.com
Address: 43.253.131.24


C:\Documents and Settings\user>ping www.playonline.com

Pinging www.playonline.com [43.253.220.30] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 43.253.220.30: bytes=32 time=233ms TTL=231
Reply from 43.253.220.30: bytes=32 time=221ms TTL=231
Reply from 43.253.220.30: bytes=32 time=222ms TTL=231
Reply from 43.253.220.30: bytes=32 time=220ms TTL=231

Ping statistics for 43.253.220.30:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 220ms, Maximum = 233ms, Average = 224ms

Edited, Jan 27th 2007 10:15pm by snky

Did you type with quotes? I thought I specified without quotes each time


If not, then use "command" without quotes

Edited, Jan 27th 2007 2:52pm by snky

You could temporarily bypass this whole DNS issue if we new the address that POL connects to in order to work, and what name it is using. If someone could post that it would let us all get in. All DNS does is say oh this Name is this IP Address. You can set all of that up on your pc using your hosts file, which does the same thing.

I think all that should be needed is one person that is logged into POL going to the command prompt (Start->Run->CMD) win2k or winxp (Start->Run->Command) Win98, and then do the following:

netstat -b
(This will show all connection either as IP Addresses or Name and what executable they are tied to)

netstat -n
(This will show all connected IP Address)

Hopefully we can tie the two together and resolve this issue.

I got a friend of mine in-game to send me his active connections (we're on Ramuh server). This is what he sent me:

  TCP    localhost:3004      207.226.177.108:80     CLOSE_WAIT 
  TCP    localhost:3005      66.11.115.50:80        CLOSE_WAIT 
  TCP    localhost:4275      207.138.235.8:80       CLOSE_WAIT 
  TCP    localhost:4631      202.67.52.64:54002     TIME_WAIT 
  TCP    localhost:24419     202.67.56.136:51246    ESTABLISHED

I masked out his IP address, however. I am assuming 202.67.52.64 is POL and 202.67.56.136 is Ramuh. Now, what exactly I can do with that, I'm not sure. >< He says netstat -b doesn't work for him and it's not an available command line option.

Edited, Jan 27th 2007 12:44pm by Palom

So with the above information, how would you edit the host file?

it is netstat -n and -b <u really dont have to type netstat -n u can do just netstat to get a list of ip addys. the -b just gives the names of who is connected to u..and vise versa


TCP 202.67.56.121:51241 ESTABLISHED 2860
[pol.exe]
is the pol ip addy as for teh server havent tried to get that yet. need to log on to shiva and find that out.

only thing i know to do is keep harrashing the cable company. i believe if it was POL's end theyt would of address it. i have TW and i have no problem connecting. i jsut know heard of the buy out lol.

  TCP    localhost:4631      202.67.52.64:54002     TIME_WAIT 
  TCP    localhost:24419     202.67.56.136:51246    ESTABLISHED

  TCP    localhost:4551      202.67.52.64:54002     TIME_WAIT 
  TCP    localhost:26537     202.67.56.132:51243    ESTABLISHED

I got two friends to send me their connection info from in-game. I found it strange that the second entry is different even though it's the same server. But, now I realize that zones are completely different server connections. The top one was taken from Xarcabard, while the bottom was taken from Lower Jeuno.

What I'm still unsure of is whether or not 202.67.52.64 is a POL connection or a Ramuh connection. Regardless, I'm not sure how any of this will even help... but still something to do other than sitting here and mashing "Retry".... ><

I dugg it, here is my reply: I to am having same issue with connection to playonline and game,. I chatted with the online support for time warner, I am a former adelphia customer, and the first thing they said was there was a server outage on my LOCAL area,. I then told them that people all over the US that were adelphia, or now comcast or time warner through the mergers, were all having same trouble,. They then transfered me to lvl 2 help who gave the speal about the earthequake in December and that they must still have issues overseas. I then told him that my connection to playonline was not impacted at all during earthquake and that issue just started a few days ago. I was also trying to do a trace route to the server and it cold not resolve the name to an IP, So I would think it was a dns issue. I was able to obtain the IP address for the service I was trying to connect to from other players who could connect through their other providers and were sharring the info on allakazam forum, After I tried to trace route directly the IP it was completed,. I gave the IP address to the time warner tech and then he did more research and said that was a misconfigured dns on their end. It seems that time warner is trying to come up with ever excuse in the book. What gets me is the consistency of the outage, seems to be same time everyday. As I write this, the issue is occuring again.

heh.. So when will we be able to play again? That all I want to know.. ;;

If its a DNS issue, try http://www.opendns.com/ change your DNS over to theirs and you don't have to worry about DNS issues. To be honest, their DNS is much faster than my own ISP's so I use them myself.

Worked great, thank you!

Edit: Nevermind, lasted about 5 minutes. Now I have a new error, POL-011

Edited, Jan 27th 2007 7:33pm by SaintIsz

Changing DNS works for browsing http://www.playonline.com but still doesn't let me get through pol