Can't access www.adobe.com or www.hardwaresecrets.com on my Xtra connection

Forums › Spark New Zealand (including Skinny and BigPipe) › Can't access www.adobe.com or www.hardwaresecrets.com on my Xtra connection

Agent24

89 posts

Master Geek

#26922 7-Oct-2008 13:43

I've had this problem for a long time now (read: months) where I can't access some websites.

www.adobe.com and www.hardwaresecrets.com are 2 that I know of, there may be more.

I have tried everything I think of but can not view these sites no matter what.

1) I have tried a different router
2) I have tried going to the website by typing directly the IP address

3) I have tried a different PC

4) I have tried different operating systems including XP, Vista, OSX, Ubuntu...

5) I even have my router set to use openDNS servers

Nothing works!!

I finally called Xtra today, they say that it's not their fault (of course)

The guy on the helpdesk eventually went an asked a technician (or so he says) who told him that it's probably Adobe's fault.

This is apparently because Adobe, being American, gives priority to USA IP addresses. When their website becomes overloaded, they block IPs from other countries. This is why I cannot access their site.

Unless this has been the case consistently and constantly for the past several months, and would appear to be only blocking my connection. (my IP is dynamic so I can't see how this works) it sounds like a load of rubbish.

Funny thing is, I can tracert to www.adobe.com and it will work fine:

C:\Users\Agent 24>tracert www.adobe.com

Tracing route to www.adobe.com [192.150.18.101]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1     2 ms     2 ms     2 ms RTA230.MSHOME [192.168.0.1]
2    50 ms    51 ms    64 ms 210-55-69-144.jetstream.southnet.co.nz [210.55.69.144]
3     *        *        *     Request timed out.
4    49 ms    49 ms    50 ms xe6-0-0-10.akbr5.global-gateway.net.nz [202.37.244.221]
5    47 ms    49 ms    50 ms xe0-0-0-2.akbr4.global-gateway.net.nz [202.50.232.77]
6   229 ms   235 ms   229 ms so-0-1-0.0-sjbr2.global-gateway.net.nz [202.50.232.22]
7   209 ms   209 ms   211 ms so0-0-1.pabr4.global-gateway.net.nz [202.50.232.86]
8   366 ms   392 ms   401 ms ge-6-24.car2.SanJose2.Level3.net [4.59.4.25]
9   233 ms   231 ms   233 ms ae-4-99.edge1.SanJose3.Level3.net [4.68.18.208]

10   345 ms   243 ms   238 ms verio-level3-10ge.SanJose1.Level3.net [4.68.111.250]
11   239 ms   242 ms   244 ms xe-1-2.r02.snjsca04.us.bb.gin.ntt.net [129.250.2.197]
12   219 ms   220 ms   219 ms te-5-3.r02.snjsca04.us.ce.gin.ntt.net [128.241.219.86]
13   212 ms   211 ms   212 ms 192.150.18.11
14   219 ms   217 ms   216 ms www.adobe.com [192.150.18.101]

Trace complete.

Does anyone know what this could possibly be caused by? Is it likely to be Telecom's fault?

wellygary

4771 posts

Uber Geek

#169583 7-Oct-2008 14:22

Try a webproxy like www.youhide.com, and see what happens,

Can you ping them?
Could be a screwy cache, but that would tend to trip up the traceroute also.

nzbnw

2369 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Spark

#169598 7-Oct-2008 15:10

Agent24:

I finally called Xtra today, they say that it's not their fault (of course)

Is it likely to be Telecom's fault?

I don't think it is a fault with Telecom's Broadband, as it works fine for me on Telecom ADSL.

nzbnw

Agent24

89 posts

Master Geek

#169731 7-Oct-2008 23:52

wellygary: Try a webproxy like www.youhide.com, and see what happens,

Can you ping them?
Could be a screwy cache, but that would tend to trip up the traceroute also.

Yeah, forgot to mention that proxy works fine. (I was using megaproxy but youhide works too)

Ping works fine too:

C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator>ping adobe.com

Pinging adobe.com [192.150.18.117] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 192.150.18.117: bytes=32 time=183ms TTL=241

Reply from 192.150.18.117: bytes=32 time=183ms TTL=241

Reply from 192.150.18.117: bytes=32 time=187ms TTL=241

Reply from 192.150.18.117: bytes=32 time=186ms TTL=241

Ping statistics for 192.150.18.117:

Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),

Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:

Minimum = 183ms, Maximum = 187ms, Average = 184ms

nzbnw:
Agent24:

I finally called Xtra today, they say that it's not their fault (of course)

Is it likely to be Telecom's fault?

I don't think it is a fault with Telecom's Broadband, as it works fine for me on Telecom ADSL.

nzbnw

I don't expect it to be across the entirety of Telecom, or it would be well known. Seems it's just me - so I meant maybe specific to my account or line etc (if that's even possible)?

When I try to load it in Firefox I just get:

Network Timeout

The server at www.adobe.com is taking too long to respond.

The requested site did not respond to a connection request and the browser has stopped waiting for a reply.

muppet

2270 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#169733 8-Oct-2008 00:01

Agent24: The guy on the helpdesk eventually went an asked a technician (or so he says) who told him that it's probably Adobe's fault.

This is apparently because Adobe, being American, gives priority to USA IP addresses. When their website becomes overloaded, they block IPs from other countries. This is why I cannot access their site.

Unless this has been the case consistently and constantly for the past several months, and would appear to be only blocking my connection. (my IP is dynamic so I can't see how this works) it sounds like a load of rubbish.

When I read things like this, I almost want to cry. Why can't people just say "We're not sure" instead of making crap up?

If you have access to a Linux device, try installing TCPTraceroute. See if you can TCP Traceroute to Adobe's site on port 80 (this is the default port TCP Traceroute uses)

Do you have a Linux host that's acting as your router? Might you have turned on ECN? (If you look at that link and think WTF? then no, you haven't turned on ECN)

Other things to try is installing Wireshark and doing a packet capture while you try to connect to Adobe. Stop it as soon as you've finished the attempt and email it to me - I'll have a look and see if there's anything obvious going on. [If you haven't used Wireshark before this probably isn't such a great idea]

Anyway, I'm sure with a bit of detective work you can track down the cause! Good luck.

Agent24

89 posts

Master Geek

#169829 8-Oct-2008 12:08

Well, I tried TCPTraceroute on my Kubuntu box which gives interesting results:

agent24@AMD900:~$ tcptraceroute www.adobe.com
Selected device eth0, address 192.168.0.8, port 44959 for outgoing packets
Tracing the path to www.adobe.com (192.150.18.101) on TCP port 80 (www), 30 hops max
1 192.168.0.1 1.534 ms 1.330 ms 1.358 ms
2 210-55-69-144.jetstream.southnet.co.nz (210.55.69.144) 51.828 ms 48.681 ms 47.768 ms
3 * * *
4 xe6-0-0-10.akbr5.global-gateway.net.nz (202.37.244.221) 46.733 ms 45.551 ms 47.707 ms
5 xe0-0-0-2.akbr4.global-gateway.net.nz (202.50.232.77) 45.394 ms * 45.936 ms
6 so-0-3-0.sjbr2.global-gateway.net.nz (203.96.120.98) 202.762 ms 201.270 ms 204.694 ms
7 so0-0-1.pabr4.global-gateway.net.nz (202.50.232.86) 285.367 ms 245.774 ms 250.369 ms
8 ge-6-24.car2.SanJose2.Level3.net (4.59.4.25) 228.159 ms 227.938 ms 227.975 ms
9 ae-4-99.edge1.SanJose3.Level3.net (4.68.18.208) 228.599 ms 228.630 ms 227.886 ms
10 * * *
11 * * *
12 te-5-3.r02.snjsca04.us.ce.gin.ntt.net (128.241.219.86) 205.528 ms 206.778 ms 206.808 ms
13 * * *
14 * * *
15 * * *
16 * * *
17 * * *
18 * * *
19 * * *
20 * * *
21 * * *
22 * * *
23 * * *
24 * * *
25 * * *
26 * * *
27 * * *
28 * * *
29 * * *
30 * * *
Destination not reached

Everything connects through unmanaged switches and my router, a Dynalink RTA-230 - there's no linux host in there anywhere, so I guess ECN doesn't apply in this case

I can get you a capture through wireshark as well if you want. Would it be better to do it on Windows or Kubuntu?

Agent24

89 posts

Master Geek

#169838 8-Oct-2008 12:36

I did the capture on Kubuntu, the file is only 2.7KB but I can't work out how to send it to you.

rattewisday

192 posts

Master Geek

#169997 8-Oct-2008 21:30

I have the exact same problem and I've figured out that the problem lies with addresses starting with 192.150.*.*.? For me my half-bridge setup seemed to be causing this though I never had a chance to narrow it down to which device.? My setup is a RTA230 half bridged to a WRT54GL.? How is your internal network setup?

Agent24

89 posts

Master Geek

#170027 8-Oct-2008 23:33

dannyres: I have the exact same problem and I've figured out that the problem lies with addresses starting with 192.150.*.*.? For me my half-bridge setup seemed to be causing this though I never had a chance to narrow it down to which device.? My setup is a RTA230 half bridged to a WRT54GL.? How is your internal network setup?

If that's the case then what about www.hardwaresecrets.com? That is 69.41.161.35
Do you have the same problem with that site also? is your ISP also Telecom?

My network is the RTA230 running in normal router mode (and DHCP server), connected to 2 unmanged switches (one uplinked to the other) - PCs all connect through either of the switches.

Agent24

89 posts

Master Geek

#170040 9-Oct-2008 01:27

Well. The problem is solved!

And it turned out to be a problem with my router(s) - yes, I think, both of them.

At some point when playing with DNS servers in my router, I rebooted only to find I couldn't login to the router anymore. After half an hour of digging up the default login (which didn't work either) I then decided to reset the thing to defaults.

Suddenly, both websites are working 100%

I checked every inch of the router config to see what might have changed, and I can only come up with 1 explanation:

When checking the "Static Route" section I noticed it seemed a bit emptier than before. When unearthed and checked on my other router (Puretek PT-3808), I found this:

Route Table Destination
Netmask
Gateway
Interface

0.0.0.0

210.55.69.144

ppp1

192.168.0.0

255.255.255.0

192.168.0.1

br0

127.0.0.1

255.0.0.0

127.0.0.1

lo0

210.55.69.144

255.255.255.255

125.238.242.207

ppp1

Now, I'm pretty sure the RTA230 had something like that in there before, but now it doesn't. And now the websites work again. Coincidence? Overlooked something? I don't know.

I'm just glad it's working again, and even better - it's not Telecom's fault - which means I don't have to talk to them about it anymore...

rattewisday

192 posts

Master Geek

#170057 9-Oct-2008 08:50

I'm glad you got it working! The reason hardwaresecrets was failing aswell is because to get to that site one of the hops is a 192.150.x.x address. I'm on Orcon so its not an ISP specific issue though it seems the RTA230 may be at fault. Keep an eye on this becuase occasionally those sites will work for me but then they will stop working again. I still havn't figured out how to get rid of it completely. :(

Agent24

89 posts

Master Geek

#170116 9-Oct-2008 12:11

Hmm...

Looks like I may have been wrong. Turns out static route and route table are different things. in the RTA230 it says:

Routing Table

All of current routing rules in your ADSL router are listed below.

Destination Netmask Gateway Interface Metric
210.55.69.144 255.255.255.255 0.0.0.0 pppoa_0_100 0
192.168.0.0 255.255.255.0 0.0.0.0 br0 0
0.0.0.0 0.0.0.0 210.55.69.144 pppoa_0_100 0

While static route is still empty.

Whether or not static route did have anything in it last time, I don't know, maybe I made a mistake. Still, it doesn't appear to make sense why it works now.