i don't know where to post this, please feel free to move it to an appropriate one if needed.


1st question
how do you get ?

NS1.YOURHOSTING.COM
NS2.YOURHOSTING.COM
NS3.YOURHOSTING.COM
NS4.YOURHOSTING.COM
NS5.YOURHOSTING.COM
NS6.YOURHOSTING.COM

2nd question.
what's the purpose of getting that many nameservers?

If you are trying to create those nameservers you need to login into the control panel for your domain name and click the link to register new nameservers. You really only need 2 nameservers a primary and a secondary but some people like to have backup nameservers.

oh i get it , thanks

no problem

The reason why you have so many dns servers is if one fails it should use the next one to resolve your site. However with most hosts they place the dns on the same box as your site so if bind fails your site will be down.

We personally use 3 boxes located worldwide so if something should go terribly wrong in the US we have servers in the UK/AU that can take over our dns handling.

Originally posted by MN-Robert

We personally use 3 boxes located worldwide so if something should go terribly wrong in the US we have servers in the UK/AU that can take over our dns handling.

say you have 3 servers

NS1 -->SERVER 1
NS2 -->SERVER 1

NS3 -->SERVER 2
NS4 -->SERVER 2

NS5 -->SERVER 3
NS6 -->SERVER 3

So if SERVER 1 fails, it will automatically resolve to SERVER 2 (different IPs)????


wow, i didn't know that
:rolleyes:

i'm lost again

It will not resolve but it will do a lookup on Server 2 to check the entry in the DNS.

No, unless you have the sites mirrored. Most hosts now have the following setup:

ns1 & ns2 = server1

ns3 & ns4 = server2

Bind fails on server1 and because you have your nameservers pointing to that server you will be down eitherway and it defeats the purpose of having two ns settings.

Our setup

ns1 = Primary dns box (US)
ns2 = Slave box (AU)
ns3 = Slave box (UK)

Now with our setup, we have over 15,000 zones in our nameservers. We use the same dns for all servers. Now say ns1 had a harddrive failure, if we kept all records on one server all of our servers would be useless ;) thats what most hosts are doing (cheaper I guess). With our setup even if two boxes had hardware failures we would still be able to route traffic to servers via our 3rd nameserver. We are still looking into placing nameservers in other locations.

Originally posted by MN-Robert
No, unless you have the sites mirrored. Most hosts now have the following setup:

ns1 & ns2 = server1

ns3 & ns4 = server2

Bind fails on server1 and because you have your nameservers pointing to that server you will be down eitherway and it defeats the purpose of having two ns settings.

Our setup

ns1 = Primary dns box (US)
ns2 = Slave box (AU)
ns3 = Slave box (UK)

Now with our setup, we have over 15,000 zones in our nameservers. We use the same dns for all servers. Now say ns1 had a harddrive failure, if we kept all records on one server all of our servers would be useless ;) thats what most hosts are doing (cheaper I guess). With our setup even if two boxes had hardware failures we would still be able to route traffic to servers via our 3rd nameserver. We are still looking into placing nameservers in other locations.

I couldn't agree more on that. The fact is that most hosts don't have that much budget to do this :)

Originally posted by Kristine
say you have 3 servers

So if SERVER 1 fails, it will automatically resolve to SERVER 2 (different IPs)????


Your listed nameservers will be utilized in more of a random fashion with the fastest/closest nameserver to your visitors handling the most requests. ns3 could handle more traffic than ns1 if it was the fastest to respond to a request.

Originally posted by UltimeWWW
I couldn't agree more on that. The fact is that most hosts don't have that much budget to do this :)

A host that can't afford to follow the RFCs isn't really a host, it's a gamble

We only have 2 locations :( US and AU, but 3 dns servers.

Originally posted by MN-Robert
The reason why you have so many dns servers is if one fails it should use the next one to resolve your site. However with most hosts they place the dns on the same box as your site so if bind fails your site will be down.

We personally use 3 boxes located worldwide so if something should go terribly wrong in the US we have servers in the UK/AU that can take over our dns handling.


Exactly.

We have redundant DNS/MAIL servers in 3 seperate locations also for the same reason. This is a good practice if you run your own DNS servers and dont want downtime.

No, unless you have the sites mirrored. Most hosts now have the following setup:

how? is it by creating A record for ns3, ns4...etc?

and with cpanel, how are you going to run your own DNS server?

Originally posted by MN-Robert
No, unless you have the sites mirrored. Most hosts now have the following setup:

ns1 & ns2 = server1

ns3 & ns4 = server2

Bind fails on server1 and because you have your nameservers pointing to that server you will be down eitherway and it defeats the purpose of having two ns settings.

Our setup

ns1 = Primary dns box (US)
ns2 = Slave box (AU)
ns3 = Slave box (UK)

Now with our setup, we have over 15,000 zones in our nameservers. We use the same dns for all servers. Now say ns1 had a harddrive failure, if we kept all records on one server all of our servers would be useless ;) thats what most hosts are doing (cheaper I guess). With our setup even if two boxes had hardware failures we would still be able to route traffic to servers via our 3rd nameserver. We are still looking into placing nameservers in other locations.

are you using some sort of CP software (CPanel, H-Sphere..) or just OS + Webmin ?

Cpanel and a few custom tweaks.

ok thank you, I still have one more question but it would be easier if I draw it :)

thank you once again Robert