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What is "Connection-specific DNS Suffix:" for and how to change it

Question

Saturday, December 12, 2015 3:04 AM

I have a netgear DSL modem which has hardcoded into it a domain name "netgear.com".  When I run IPCONFIG /all I see that the domain name from the modem is showing up in the "Connection-specific DNS Suffix:" field and the "DNS Suffix Search List. . . . . . :" field as "netgear.com".   The "netgear.com" info is also used in the "Tunnel adapter isatap.netgear.com:.  Here is the rest of the adapters info:

Windows IP Configuration

   Host Name . . . . . . . . . . . . .....: MARK-PC
   Primary Dns Suffix  . . . . . . . .:
   Node Type . . . . . . . . . . . . ......: Hybrid
   IP Routing Enabled. . . . . . . . : No
   WINS Proxy Enabled. . . . . . . : No
   DNS Suffix Search List. . . . . . : netgear.com <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<What does this do?

Ethernet adapter Ethernet:

   Connection-specific DNS Suffix  . : netgear.com <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<What does this do?
   Description . . . . . . . . . . . ...................: Intel(R) I211 Gigabit Network Connection
   Physical Address. . . . . . . . ................ : D0-50-99-85-E0-81
   DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . ................ . . . : Yes
   Autoconfiguration Enabled . . ...... . : Yes
   IPv6 Address. . . . . . . . . . .................... : 2602:306:c48d:5ad9:78fd:cb55:887d:86c1(Preferred)
   Temporary IPv6 Address. . . ........ . . : 2602:306:c48d:5ad9:1166:7e10:fca3:f698(Preferred)
   Temporary IPv6 Address. . . . . . .......: 2602:306:c48d:5ad9:d018:4158:2f6d:be2f(Deprecated)
   Link-local IPv6 Address . . . . ............ : fe80::78fd:cb55:887d:86c1%5(Preferred)
   IPv4 Address. . . . . . . . . . . ....................: 192.168.0.173(Preferred)
   Subnet Mask . . . . . . . . . . . ...................: 255.255.255.0
   Lease Obtained. . . . . . . . . . ..................: Thursday, December 10, 2015 12:27:59 AM
   Lease Expires . . . . . . . . . . ......................: Thursday, December 17, 2015 12:28:02 AM
   Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . ..................: fe80::6e72:20ff:fe3e:c1aa%5
                                                             192.168.0.1
   DHCP Server . . . . . . . . . . ....................... : 192.168.0.1
   DHCPv6 IAID . . . . . . . . . . ....................... : 63983769
   DHCPv6 Client DUID. . . . . . . . ...............: 00-01-00-01-1D-CC-29-77-D0-50-99-85-E0-83
   DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . .......................: 2001:4860:4860::8888
                                                               2620:0:ccc::2
                                                               8.8.8.8
                                                               208.67.222.222
   NetBIOS over Tcpip. . . . . . . ................... : Enabled

Tunnel adapter isatap.netgear.com: <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<What does this do and what is it?
   Media State . . . . . . . . . . ................. : Media disconnected
   Connection-specific DNS Suffix   : netgear.com
   Description . . . . . . . . . . .................. : Microsoft ISATAP Adapter
   Physical Address. . . . . . . . . ............: 00-00-00-00-00-00-00-E0
   DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . . ............: No
   Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . ..: Yes

Tunnel adapter Teredo Tunneling Pseudo-Interface:

   Connection-specific DNS Suffix  . :
   Description . . . . . . . . . . .................... : Teredo Tunneling Pseudo-Interface
   Physical Address. . . . . . . . ............... : 00-00-00-00-00-00-00-E0
   DHCP Enabled. . . . . . . . . . ............... : No
   Autoconfiguration Enabled . . . . ...: Yes
   IPv6 Address. . . . . . . . . . .................. : 2001:0:5ef5:79fb:8b2:2d16:933a:9fea(Preferred)
   Link-local IPv6 Address . . . . . .........: fe80::8b2:2d16:933a:9fea%7(Preferred)
   Default Gateway . . . . . . . . . :
   DHCPv6 IAID . . . . . . . . . . . ................: 134217728
   DHCPv6 Client DUID. . . . . . . ........... : 00-01-00-01-1D-CC-29-77-D0-50-99-85-E0-83
   NetBIOS over Tcpip. . . . . . . . ............: Disabled

The internet has been a little slower and I occasionally get DNS errors, but in general things are OK.  Do I need to be concerned about the "netgear.com" entry?  What would you recommend?

All replies (1)

Sunday, December 13, 2015 9:30 AM âś…Answered

the only real effect that you're likely to see from having 'netgear.com' in the suffix search list is as follows:

if you type http://www.microsoft.com or www.microsoft.com or Microsoft.com in your browser you will be taken to www.microsoft.com

if you type in Microsoft then it will likely try http://microsoft and http://microsoft.netgear.com before either returning a 404 (page not found) or dropping you into your search engine

I doubt there are any malicious pages at *.netgear.com so you're probably fine ignoring it.  Ideally you'd take a look at your internet router and remove it though.

as for the ISATAP piece, that's a special windows adaptor that lets you tunnel IPv6 through a IPv4 connection.  You could disable IPv6, which would get rid of this adaptor, and you'd probably not miss it at this stage.  There isn't really any point in disabling it though - and at some point IPv6 might actually become relevant so you're safe to ignore it.