What is a traceroute? How do I obtain a traceroute? | Domain Hosting

What is a traceroute? How do I obtain a traceroute?

To help you in determining the location and cause of a connection problem, FastVirtual support staff need to examine a traceroute.

A traceroute shows the path data packets take as they travel between your computer to our servers. As there are likely to be multiple routers between you and us, there are numerous points at which packet loss and instability could occur.

A normal traceroute to FastVirtual may look like this:

1. 32ms 32ms 31ms tas2-hfc1.san.rr.com [204.210.32.8]
2. 12ms 13ms 16ms tas1-fddi.san.rr.com [204.230.6.22]
3. 41ms 27ms 25ms 7521-atm.san.rr.com [204.210.1.253]
4. 74ms 36ms 57ms c2-hssi5.mci.net [166.48.174.12]
5. 67ms 52ms 57ms core2.SanFrancisco.mci.net [204.71.4.15]
6. 41ms 43ms 47ms sl-ana-4-F0/0.sprintlink.net [144.228.71.3]
7. 61ms 35ms 52ms sl-atmn-3-h0-T3.sprintlink.net [144.228.79.22]
8. 36ms 82ms 51ms sd-gw-1-OC3c.atmnet.net [207.67.242.3]
9. 85ms 51ms 31ms sd-ph-1.atmnet.net [207.67.241.122]
10. 52ms 71ms 44ms fastvirtual.com [209.240.147.63]

As you would expect, with normal traceroute, where 1 is your computer, and 10 is FastVirtual, the times (in milliseconds) gradually increase, but they all remain relatively low. No stars (“*”) appear in the millisecond column . If you are connecting through a dial-up connection, the times you see may be significantly higher, but you should still see a gradual increase with no large differences.

A traceroute that shows instability and packet loss may look like this:

1. 33ms 31ms 31ms tas2-hfc1.san.rr.com [204.210.32.8]
2. 11ms 19ms 13ms tas1-fddi.san.rr.com [204.230.6.22]
3. 61ms 29ms 29ms 7521-atm.san.rr.com [204.210.1.253]
4. 409ms 452ms 399ms c2-hssi5.mci.net [166.48.174.12]
5. 402ms 391ms 441ms core2.SanFrancisco.mci.net [204.71.4.15]
6. 394ms 479ms 419ms pb-nap.geo.net [198.32.141.26]
7. 632ms * 404ms MaeWest-rt1-h0.geo.net [166.90.5.39]
8. 451ms 419ms 422ms mae-west.atmnet.net [198.32.132.81]
9. 422ms 578ms * ms sd-gw-1-OC3c.atmnet.net [207.67.242.3]
10. 421ms * ms 443 ms sd-ph-1.atmnet.net [207.67.241.122]
11. 443ms 424ms * ms fastvirtual.com [209.240.147.63]

In this case, there is probably a significant delay between 3 and 4, with substantial packet loss between 6 and 7. Numbers are affected by the previous route. In the above example, the FastVirtual network is probably stable, but it appears unstable due to the problems between 3 and 4, and again between 6 and 7.