FFnet won't load

[Churchey]

I have no issues loading any other websites.
Going from chapter to chapter on FFN involves me spam clicking "next"
It either takes ten minutes to tell me it couldn't load, or loads it instantly.
Google just gives me a bunch of year old yahoo answers questions with no solutions.

Anyone have any ideas what's going on here?

[yak]

How are we meant to help you when you don't even tell us what browser you're using, or whether this happens in multiple browsers, or what version they are, and when it started happening [month/year]. Android, iPhone, Windows, Mac?

At least the browser name. Come on. This is basic stuff, Churchey.

[Sacro]

Got the same problem from time to time - it works for some time and then it gets slow or doesn't load at all.

I use Firefox on Windows 7 Ultimate x64. The Windows was recently installed, since I got a new HDD, but the problem started 1 or 2 months before the "purge" on FFN I think, when I was still using my old HDD with a 2 year old Windows installation.

[yak]

I'm sure that FF has a simple way of disabling all extensions, addons, greasemonkey, etc [in Chrome you'd use Incognito mode]. Next time ff.net's acting wonky, try with everything disabled. Stylesheets included.

[Kyouzou]

I don't use any of the addons on Firefox, latest version, and I get the same problems, it usually fixes itself after a restart but on occasion it takes a day or two. Oh and I'm running Windows 7 Premium.

[Churchey]

I use windows 7. I experience this problem on chrome and firefox. Both run with 0 addons.
I'll give it a shot in incognito, but I'm pretty sure I've tried that already with no difference
It's a recent thing, because I haven't actually browsed FFN in awhile as I've been sticking to the DLP WBA boards instead.

edit: incognito doesn't do anything either

---------- Post automerged at 09:37 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:57 PM ----------

So power started flickering every minute at around 3:30 and didn't stabilize till 4:10. After that, internet was down for 4 hours.
Following that I had only a little trouble accessing FFN (only took a dozen clicks to get between chapters instead of a thousand).
About 20 minutes ago, after an hour of browsing FFN, problem reappeared and I can't load it at all in firefox (no addons), chrome (no addons), or chrome incognito.

[yak]

Turn off your modem and/or router for two minutes.

[Churchey]

No luck. I've also restarted chrome/mozila, restarted my comp, and flushed my dns in between attempts with no change.

[yak]

I've got a few other ideas to check.

Are you using any ad-blocking software?
Has your HOSTS file been modified?
Does ff.net behaviour change when you're logged in/out?
Does the mobile version of the site work properly? Just change the www. to m. eg. http://m.fanfiction.net/s/8118551/1/

edit: How about manually copy-pasting the URL of the next chapter directly into the browser rather than using the next-chapter button?

[Churchey]

No ad blocking software.
I haven't modified my HOSTS file, is it possible that something could have modified it without me knowing?
FF.net behavior doesn't change while logged in/out.
The mobile version loads on my phone just fine, but once again won't work on my browsers.

Copy-pasting doesn't work either. I've also tried to google my way to the story as well as editing a bookmark address and trying to get there from it.

[yak]

Some malware can alter your HOSTS file, but I don't think that's the culprit here. It doesn't really fit the symptoms. I was just covering bases.

Do you have the same trouble accessing non-story pages, such as the main ff.net page?

Try trace routing to fanfiction.net and pasting the results here.

Don't bother pinging them though. They seem to have blocked that.

[Churchey]

Yes, same issues when accessing any part of ffn.

tracert gives me regular hops to 12 and then request timed out for 13-30, waiting for it to finish to post

---------- Post automerged at 11:53 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:52 PM ----------

Microsoft Windows [Version 6.1.7600]
Copyright (c) 2009 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

tracert fanfiction.net

Tracing route to fanfiction.net [208.94.146.70]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

1 28 ms 15 ms 11 ms univ-trails.ex-nets.com [10.20.1.1]
2 23 ms 26 ms 31 ms 173-219-185-129.sta.suddenlink.net [173.219.185.
129]
3 18 ms 13 ms 8 ms 173-219-249-28-link.sta.suddenlink.net [173.219.
249.28]
4 16 ms 16 ms 15 ms 173-219-249-43-link.sta.suddenlink.net [173.219.
249.43]
5 24 ms 23 ms 23 ms 173-219-248-218-link.sta.suddenlink.net [173.219
.248.218]
6 24 ms 26 ms 21 ms 173-219-254-171-link.tex.sta.suddenlink.net [173
.219.254.171]
7 34 ms 32 ms 33 ms eqix.dlfw.twtelecom.net [206.223.118.36]
8 49 ms 50 ms 52 ms ash1-ar4-xe-0-1-0-0.us.twtelecom.net [66.192.241
.26]
9 147 ms 217 ms 220 ms cr2.iad1.inforelay.net [66.231.176.10]
10 57 ms 57 ms 59 ms cr1.iad2.inforelay.net [66.231.176.246]
11 60 ms 62 ms 62 ms cr2.iad2.inforelay.net [66.231.181.6]
12 55 ms 58 ms 61 ms cr2.iad3.inforelay.net [67.208.89.117]
13 * * * Request timed out.
14 * * * Request timed out.
15 * * * Request timed out.
16 * * * Request timed out.
17 * * * Request timed out.
18 * * * Request timed out.
19 * * * Request timed out.
20 * * * Request timed out.
21 * * * Request timed out.
22 * * * Request timed out.
23 * * * Request timed out.
24 * * * Request timed out.
25 * * * Request timed out.
26 * * * Request timed out.
27 * * * Request timed out.
28 * * * Request timed out.
29 * * * Request timed out.
30 * * * Request timed out.

Trace complete.

[yak]

That looks perfectly normal, Churchey. I was expecting to see drop outs somewhere indicating a poor network, but there's nothing there.

Here's mine for comparison.

Tracing route to fanfiction.net [208.94.146.81]
over a maximum of 30 hops:

  1    <1 ms    <1 ms    <1 ms  home.gateway [192.168.1.254]
  2    46 ms    46 ms    47 ms  lns20.per2.internode.on.net [150.101.0.207]
  3    47 ms    47 ms    47 ms  gi6-0-2.cor1.per2.internode.on.net [150.101.0.158]
  4   257 ms   258 ms   258 ms  gi0-0-7.per1.internode.on.net [150.101.172.185]
  5   257 ms   257 ms   259 ms  pos1-0.bdr1.adl6.internode.on.net [150.101.199.237]
  6   258 ms   260 ms   257 ms  te0-0-0-0.bdr2.adl6.internode.on.net [203.16.212.226]
  7   258 ms   258 ms   256 ms  te4-0-0.bdr1.syd6.internode.on.net [150.101.134.186]
  8   257 ms   258 ms   256 ms  pos1-0-0.bdr1.lax1.internode.on.net [203.16.213.190]
  9   259 ms   259 ms   261 ms  gig.nlayer-la1.internode.on.net [203.16.213.58]
 10   257 ms   258 ms   259 ms  ae0-90g.cr1.lax1.us.nlayer.net [69.31.127.137]
 11   290 ms   316 ms   291 ms  xe-1-0-0.cr1.iah1.us.nlayer.net [69.22.142.121]
 12   305 ms   305 ms   306 ms  xe-4-2-1.cr1.atl1.us.nlayer.net [69.22.142.118]
 13   320 ms   320 ms   319 ms  xe-0-1-0.cr2.iad1.us.nlayer.net [69.22.142.106]
 14   324 ms   325 ms   320 ms  ae2-30g.ar2.iad1.us.nlayer.net [69.31.31.186]
 15   322 ms   321 ms   321 ms  as33597.xe-3-0-7-301.ar2.iad1.us.nlayer.net [69.31.30.230]
 16   321 ms   321 ms   320 ms  cr2.iad1.inforelay.net [66.231.176.10]
 17   320 ms   319 ms   319 ms  cr1.iad2.inforelay.net [66.231.176.246]
 18   320 ms   322 ms   320 ms  cr2.iad2.inforelay.net [66.231.181.6]
 19   320 ms   319 ms   320 ms  cr2.iad3.inforelay.net [67.208.89.117]
 20     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 21     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 22     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 23     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 24     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 25     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 26     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 27     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 28     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 29     *        *        *     Request timed out.
 30     *        *        *     Request timed out.

I did a second trace to 50 hops, but it still kept timing out.

[Churchey]

Still can't access ffn though.

[yak]

Oh, I have another idea. Try accessing fanfiction.net through a web proxy.

eg. http://www.access7sure.info/ <-- It works for me, and I can browse ff.net on it, but I don't know anything about the site. Don't trust it with any login details, etc.

[wordhammer]

Just to clarify- ping fanfiction.net is not the same as ping www.fanfiction.net. They resolve to different addresses.

Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]
(C) Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.

C:\Documents and Settings\Profile>ping fanfiction.net

Pinging fanfiction.net [208.94.146.80] with 32 bytes of data:

Control-C
^C
C:\Documents and Settings\Profile>ping www.fanfiction.net

Pinging www.fanfiction.net [209.151.227.84] with 32 bytes of data:

Reply from 209.151.227.84: bytes=32 time=74ms TTL=52
Reply from 209.151.227.84: bytes=32 time=72ms TTL=52
Reply from 209.151.227.84: bytes=32 time=71ms TTL=52
Reply from 209.151.227.84: bytes=32 time=72ms TTL=52

Ping statistics for 209.151.227.84:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 71ms, Maximum = 74ms, Average = 72ms

C:\Documents and Settings\Profile>

People have been complaining of this on several different forums of late.This site seems to have the ear of one of their admins (named Xing). Much of the trouble is associated with bad links using https:// instead of straight
http://www.fanfiction.net, problems with 'sync' between sites and I would assume a few issues with garbage in the site info for Flash usage.

I'd recommend testing the full address, and if you still have problems, delete all browser cache and maybe the folder here:
%UserProfile%\Application Data\Macromedia\Flash Player\macromedia.com\support\flashplayer\sys\#www.fanfiction.net

[Churchey]

The proxy server is working currently, but I will look into your suggestion for a permanent solution and update later wordhammer.

Thanks all, especially Yak for the help.