weird VPN issue from XP guest

Accidentally I posted this in the wrong newsgroup yesterday...
This issue is not a VS2005 problem, rather it is a vpc problem (or
networking in general...).

------------------------------------------------------------------
I have encountered a weird problem with an XP Pro guest when I use
Microsoft VPN:

- I create the connection in the new connection wizard
- I set it to use PPTP VPN
- I also set it to show logon domain, otherwise it is default
- When I use it to connect it does so just fine.
- But whenever I try to reach anything on the remote network it fails!

So I looked at what would happen if I ping and this is the result:

If I ping by name I get this result:
c:\>ping dc02

Pinging dc02.bredbandsbolaget.se [208.67.217.132] with 32 bytes of
data:

Request timed out.

Ping statistics for 208.67.217.132:
Packets: Sent = 1, Received = 0, Lost = 1 (100% loss),

But if I use the IP address to do the ping it works:

c:\>ping 10.0.0.7

Pinging 10.0.0.7 with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 10.0.0.7: bytes=32 time=190ms TTL=128

Ping statistics for 10.0.0.7:
Packets: Sent = 3, Received = 3, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 188ms, Maximum = 190ms, Average = 189ms

The extra .bredbandsbolaget.se that was added to the name shows the
name of my ADSL provider so apparently there is a DNS request being
passed through to another connection rather than the VPN I intended it
to go through!

The name resolution should go through my HOSTS file since the VPN does
not for some reason forward the DNS requests either. So I had added
the server to the hosts file like this:

10.0.0.7 DC02

*Always* in the past when I have dealt with networking issues it has
worked to put an entry into the HOSTS file if name resolution did not
happen.

But now all of a sudden the name resolution is no longer done via the
hosts file by the looks of it.

I have two recently created XP-Pro SP3 guests that behave the same
way. They both use the host's NIC and receive the IP address from my
D-Link router connected by ADSL to my IPSP bredbandsbolaget.

Finally, ipconfig / all gives this (slightly edited):

Ethernet adapter Local Area Connection:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . : bredbandsbolaget.se

Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-0C-29-0D-93-36
Dhcp Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : Yes
Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . : Yes
IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.0.138
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.0
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.0.129
DHCP Server . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.0.129
DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.0.129

PPP adapter AGI-VPN:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . :
Description . . . . . . . . . . . : WAN (PPP/SLIP) Interface
Physical Address. . . . . . . . . : 00-53-45-00-00-00
Dhcp Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . : No
IP Address. . . . . . . . . . . . : 10.0.0.160
Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . : 255.255.255.255
Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . : 10.0.0.160
DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 10.0.0.7
10.0.0.4
Primary WINS Server . . . . . . . : 10.0.0.4


Could it be some Windows update issue at play here? Both of the guests
were allowed to get all of the Windows updates before I started using
them.

PS: Other XP guests can use VPN without this issue....

--

Bo Berglund (Sweden)

On Fri, 04 Dec 2009 18:03:59 +0100, Bo Berglund
<> wrote:

>I have encountered a weird problem with an XP Pro guest when I use
>Microsoft VPN:
>
>- I create the connection in the new connection wizard
>- I set it to use PPTP VPN
>- I also set it to show logon domain, otherwise it is default
>- When I use it to connect it does so just fine.
>- But whenever I try to reach anything on the remote network it fails!
>
.....
>
>The name resolution should go through my HOSTS file since the VPN does
>not for some reason forward the DNS requests either. So I had added
>the server to the hosts file like this:
>
>10.0.0.7 DC02
>
>*Always* in the past when I have dealt with networking issues it has
>worked to put an entry into the HOSTS file if name resolution did not
>happen.
>
>But now all of a sudden the name resolution is no longer done via the
>hosts file by the looks of it.
....
>
>Could it be some Windows update issue at play here? Both of the guests
>were allowed to get all of the Windows updates before I started using
>them.
>

It looks like it is indeed a Windows thing!
I found that there is a service called "DNS Client" running on my
XPProSP3 PC. If I stop this then the hosts file is consulted first
before any DNS servers are asked and now my connection works as
expected!
I cannot recall seeing this behaviour before, so maybe the service has
changed as a result of some Windows Update"
Or else there are some settings for it that I don't know about and
which are OK on PC:s that were originally installed from XP Pro SP2
media and later updated to SP3 level but broken on PC:s installed from
SP3 media like my recent (problematic) guests?

Anyway, if you see this problem, just stp the DNS Client service.

--

Bo Berglund (Sweden)

Interesting! I didn't know it would work that way either.

I never really liked the DNS client anyway, I thought it was pretty redundant
for little benefit.

--
Bob Comer




Bo Berglund wrote:
> On Fri, 04 Dec 2009 18:03:59 +0100, Bo Berglund
> <> wrote:
>
>> I have encountered a weird problem with an XP Pro guest when I use
>> Microsoft VPN:
>>
>> - I create the connection in the new connection wizard
>> - I set it to use PPTP VPN
>> - I also set it to show logon domain, otherwise it is default
>> - When I use it to connect it does so just fine.
>> - But whenever I try to reach anything on the remote network it fails!
>>
> .....
>> The name resolution should go through my HOSTS file since the VPN does
>> not for some reason forward the DNS requests either. So I had added
>> the server to the hosts file like this:
>>
>> 10.0.0.7 DC02
>>
>> *Always* in the past when I have dealt with networking issues it has
>> worked to put an entry into the HOSTS file if name resolution did not
>> happen.
>>
>> But now all of a sudden the name resolution is no longer done via the
>> hosts file by the looks of it.
> ....
>> Could it be some Windows update issue at play here? Both of the guests
>> were allowed to get all of the Windows updates before I started using
>> them.
>>
>
> It looks like it is indeed a Windows thing!
> I found that there is a service called "DNS Client" running on my
> XPProSP3 PC. If I stop this then the hosts file is consulted first
> before any DNS servers are asked and now my connection works as
> expected!
> I cannot recall seeing this behaviour before, so maybe the service has
> changed as a result of some Windows Update"
> Or else there are some settings for it that I don't know about and
> which are OK on PC:s that were originally installed from XP Pro SP2
> media and later updated to SP3 level but broken on PC:s installed from
> SP3 media like my recent (problematic) guests?
>
> Anyway, if you see this problem, just stp the DNS Client service.
>