Windows Xp And Net-7 Portal

[Brack]

Greetings, I noticed for the last couple weeks of July 7th to 20th 2012 The Net-7 Portal goes offline at midnight EST for about 20 to 30 minutes, are you rebooting? or adding or editing something?

I explain whats happening when the site goes offline, while in game on the XP machine when Portal goes, it will freeze my game an bounce me out, I have to minimize the game an exit out cause of the stall in the game, I don't know if it's because am logged into the Portal or not when it happens, I'll have to test that theory. Perhaps others are experiencing the same.

After the Portal back online I can launch the game again an get back in, this only happens on my XP machine, our other PC's have different OS's on them.

am wondering if being logged in to the Portal doing this, or makes a difference in crashing or freezing of the game when the site goes offline.

Here's the Error or the message the launcher gives me when I LaunchNet-7 Launcher

(Error on checking server status. Details: Value cannot be null. Parameter name: address)

When i click on details at the bottom it gives me more info, reads like this,

LauncherNet7 - Error

Following errors occurred while checking for updates:

Error while checking updates for 'Net 7'
Details: The remote name could not be resolved: 'patch.net-7.org'

I have screenshot in case you need to see it, just as easy to type it out.

is there a tweak, or work around to fix this? or is the XP machine just being a dinosaur? runs the game awesome tho

Thank you if you can advise

Edited June 28, 2013 by Brack

[Zackman [LDEV]]

Short answer:

You have a DNS problem (did you check this ? -> http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2406837,00.asp )
These errors are saying, that the DNS of the services (like Net 7 etc) cant be resolved anymore - so you get timeouts and finally drop off.

Also a virus/trojan/hijacker might cause this - have your XP machine checked/cleaned.

Best luck!

[Brack]

Thank you Zac, I checked this site when they announced the crap on CNN before the GOV turned off their site, namely this one

[url="http://www.dns-ok.us/"]http://www.dns-ok.us/[/url] and this one too [url="http://www.dcwg.org/"]http://www.dcwg.org/[/url]

Also I run checkups once a week on all our PC's an updates of all software and firmware and drivers etc. I run a clean ship on all our vessels here although it's not fool proof that some weirdness happens where PC's are concerned

am thinking it's cause am logged in the Portal when it goes offline for maintenance or just a reboot on thier end, it takes the game engine offline on my XP machine here, an it's only the Portal [url="http://www.net-7.org/"]http://www.net-7.org/[/url] that it happens with, no other site

But, There's always room for more research an advice, Thank you Zac

[Zackman [LDEV]]

Well..like said, there is no scheduled maintainance on the portal, so something is happening local on your end.

This message here
[quote]
(Error on checking server status. Details: Value cannot be null. Parameter name: address)
[/quote]

is clearly indicating, that your DNS is gone.

You might wanna check, if this happens exactly the same time every night/day - and if so, if your router/modem is disconnected from the ISP that moment (24h disconnect) and reconnecting the line, and therefore dropping DNS resolving and also getting a new IP on reconnect., which would cause such interrupts as well.

Easy test:
1-2h before this normally happens, visit this URL and write down the IP: http://whatismyipaddress.com/

After it happend, visit this URL again and recheck if the number (IP) has changed. If so, you just had a disconnect.
The reason your XP machine is taking more of a hit from it (then the other machines) can have various reasons - but thats not important now.

What you also (additionally) can do is, have a command window open (open "run" and type cmd).
Exactly when this happens, type
ping google.com
and see, if you get ping-lines in return or something like "can't resolve URL google.com" (something like this...).

IF(!) you get ping-lines, repeat this command with
ping heise.de (to make sure you ping a site you didnt visit before - and most likely you never visited this german site before )

When you get ping-lines again, type
ping net-7.org

If you don't get ping-lines here, we talk again...

[Zackman [LDEV]]

PS.:

I can see that your IP is the same from your first posting and your last posting (and there are almost 12h diff) - so the chance is high you have a ISP-refetch-line mechanism in the night time or static at midnight, when the new day beginns.
Every ISP is handling this different.

[Kyp [LDEV]]

To be fair Zackman, we do have the Server Backup started from midnight, but most of the backups shouldn't be lasting 30 minutes.

[Zackman [LDEV]]

Ah right, the backup...ya.
I was more thinking of the portal code and if we have anything in which is scheduled at this time - didn't think about server backup (outside of portal scope ).

[Brack]

Thank you again Kyp and Zac, all good info noted, I made a note of all IP's addresses of all machines here, their all the same for the External IP, am on a Router too, so each Internal IP going be little different, unless I got it backwards lol vice a virsa

I knew the Portal was going offline at midnight here, cause I can stay logged in on my other PC's, an I ask in Guild chat if anyone else is seeing the same thing, or able to get to the Portal site, and they can't as well when backups are happening, or just a reboot on your side.

I tend to exaggerate a little about the time it's offline, Kyp correct, might be more like 10 to 15 minutes in duration, then it's back online, I stand corrected.

last night when the Portal went offline at midnight of course, i was logged into it, an in the game, nothing happened I stayed ingame and played on, if you fixed something on your end, Thank you.

Zac Thank you for the info about DNS and doing a ping, and writing down my IP address, if I get bounced out again, I will follow your instructions and see if it's changed at that moment.

Thank you again

[Zackman [LDEV]]

Its probably the backup then, because your guildies had the very same experience.
What makes me wonder is, that the backup is obv. putting such load on the server that it becomes inresponsive.