Howdy, Stranger!

It looks like you're new here. If you want to get involved, click one of these buttons!


A Simple DNS Solution
New on LowEndTalk? Please Register and read our Community Rules.

All new Registrations are manually reviewed and approved, so a short delay after registration may occur before your account becomes active.

A Simple DNS Solution

zonzon Member
edited January 2012 in Tutorials

Recently i bought some 96 and 128 boxes but while setting up dns was a major issue as bind takes lots of memory... then i tried free dns solutions but many of them are out of business or changed to paid services... finally today i found out a solution for this... Shared hosting server as a DNS server !!

Configured one account with my shared hosting provider (with same domain name)... then advanced dns editor changed A record pointing my VPS IP.. then use the shared ns entries...and it is working fine !!!

so i think it is a great idea to use your shared hosting server as a dns server... So my recommendation is setup one primary bind server and use your shared hosting servers are alternative dns servers...

i hope this will help somebody looking for a free dns solution... also let us discuss about the +ves and -ves... expert opinions please........

Comments

  • Hi Zon,

    Some resources for you....

    http://www.pointhq.com allow 10 domains on the free account. I have an Atech Identity account for CodebaseHQ where we keep our GiT repos. They're quite a good company.

    Your other option (if you're with BuyVM or Hostigation) is that they offer Free DNS management. Usually it's just a CPanel login for DNS, probably the same as what you're using now. Just ask your VPS provider if they offer free DNS management.

  • Most domain registrars provide a free DNS service. As for hosting your own DNS, you could use NSD3 which uses BIND zone configuration files, so it's easy to drop-in replace BIND, and only uses a few MB of RAM.

  • zonzon Member

    @ Joel
    pointhq seems to be good.. i will try... i have one hostigation account.. but without CPanel .. still i be able to use it ?

    @Kuro does Godaddy provides free dns ? in my account when i go to dns manager it says 'zone file not found' and there is one premium dns option ($2.99/month).

  • @zon said: i have one hostigation account.. but without CPanel .. still i be able to use it ?

    Yes, I believe so. As long as you have a VPS there just open a ticket, Tim basically gives a CPanel login with no hosting so its just for all your DNS.

  • http://www.lowendtalk.com/wiki/free-dns-providers

    Just put a domain on DNS Trouble today (uses Softlayer's Anycast DNS)... Can't complain.

  • Why not just use Godaddy?

  • @joodle said: Why not just use Godaddy?

    Do you really think that suggesting GoDaddy is such a great idea considering SOPA?
    Genuine question and curiosity there.

  • cloudflare.com, afraid.org, zoneedit.com?

  • I use Linode DNS, but you have to be a customer.

  • zonzon Member

    i have zoneedit account.. but only 2 free zones...

  • fanfan Veteran

    http://www.lowendtalk.com/wiki/free-dns-providers

    Just put a domain on DNS Trouble today (uses Softlayer's Anycast DNS)... Can't complain.

    So far DNS Trouble worked well for me, but I'm still curious about their relationship with Softlayer.

  • This guy did some comparisons of free DNS hosts. http://www.hostcult.com/2011/06/free-hosted-dns-review-yay-i-think.html

    He found Namecheap's free dns servers as one of the best. I have used them and they are awesome. They also have 5 ns servers now for the free one.

  • I use most of the time cloudns.net(paid version) or the free DNS service of internetbs.net both are great.

  • AdamAdam Member
    edited January 2012

    @fan said: So far DNS Trouble worked well for me, but I'm still curious about their relationship with Softlayer.

    Just sent a support ticket... Will let you know what they say.

    EDIT:

    Reply from their Director:

    We have a fixed agreement in place to ensure that the DNS Service will always remain active via their infrastructure.

  • Use nsd3 instead of bind. It uses much less memory than bind, but can read bind zone files.

  • zonzon Member

    @Kuro and @dannix

    thanks for the info.. started using nsd3.. nice...

  • Anyone using MaraDNS here? :P

  • @yomero said: Anyone using MaraDNS here? :P

    Yes. Since a few months. Best DNS-server for my needs.

  • @zon said: Recently i bought some 96 and 128 boxes but while setting up dns was a major issue as bind takes lots of memory

    What other things were you running on them? We're renting 8 VPS containers that are all at least 128mb, all of them with Cpanel DNSONLY, and they're all using 90 to 100mb serving 600+ zones.

  • zonzon Member

    @Damian4IPXcore : i have many low traffic sites... so each box i am filling with 4-5 such sites... but dynamic sites.. so when i load apache/php/mysql bind is a problem.. i tried leb lnmp script... but i am familiar with apache.. also i have many htaccess entries in each site... anyway now nsd3 is working fine now... created a master/slave setup..

    i also configured bind in my amazon aws which has 613mb.. its working fine.. but i am not able to stop it... when i try to stop it says failed.. then i have to reboot the instance.. this problem i faced when i configured in vps also.. is this a common issue ? or any configuration error ?

  • Ah, that's the difference: our DNS nodes are only doing DNS. :)

  • zonzon Member

    yes... then it shd work fine.... i dont want to dedicate 2 nodes for dns... when there are many free options available... also the shared hosting option i mentioned above too working fine... i have 10+ shared hosting accounts.. with good providers like hawkhost, mdd, stable etc.. since i am moving my main sites to vps so i can use those accounts for this purpose...

  • Anyone know what that DNS Server that uses MySQL is called, I may setup a redundant DNS service for LeT Users in my free time,

  • Anyone know what that DNS Server that uses MySQL is called, I may setup a redundant DNS service for LeT Users in my free time,

    PowerDNS?

  • MyDNS is one of them. We used it for awhile, but it had issues with stability and memory leaks. Unfortunately the stability issues wasn't that the process was dying, it's that it would somehow lock up and stop responding to requests.

    It's been about a year or so since we used it, so maybe they've hammered out those issues.

  • twaintwain Member

    @Damian said: What other things were you running on them? We're renting 8 VPS containers that are all at least 128mb, all of them with Cpanel DNSONLY, and they're all using 90 to 100mb serving 600+ zones.

    cPanel DNSONLY relies/links to a paid cPanel instance is this correct? Or can you use cPanel DNSONLY entirely cost-free?

  • raindog308raindog308 Administrator, Veteran

    @zon said: does Godaddy provides free dns ? in my account when i go to dns manager it says 'zone file not found' and there is one premium dns option ($2.99/month).

    GoDaddy does not provide anything for free. I suggest you find a better registrar as they are the absolutely worst in my opinion.

    For what you pay for registration alone, you could get registration + free WHOIS protection + DNS + other features from Internet.bs

    That's just an example.

    Really. Change registrars. You're being ripped off.

    Thanked by 2rds100 Infinity
  • netomxnetomx Moderator, Veteran

    @raindog308 said: @zon said: does Godaddy provides free dns ? in my account when i go to dns manager it says 'zone file not found' and there is one premium dns option ($2.99/month).

    If you have a domain with them, yes, dns are free

Sign In or Register to comment.