HELP – PING Command

This command will send an echo request to a remote computer and wait for a response. Ping is used primarily to troubleshoot Internet connections.

Enter an IP Address or Host Name in the Query Box. Then hit enter or click the Go! button.

Your results will be displayed as following:

Pinging... yahoo.com [204.71.177.35] with 64 bytes of data:

Reply from 204.71.177.35: Bytes = 64 RTT = 183ms TTL = 239
. . . . .

Ping statistics for:  204.71.177.35
    Packets: Sent = 4   Received = 3   Loss = 1  [25.00%]
  RT Times: Min = 183ms   Max = 286ms   Avg = 242.75ms

If the remote computer is experiencing problems or the internet connection is poor, you may see the message:

“****  Request Timeout  ****”

This means that the remote server did not reply back to the request in time. Clean internet connections will usually result in very low Packet Loss and lower average RTT times.

DEFINITIONS:

Bytes = the amount of data that was sent to the remote computer. This value may be changed by clicking the more… button.

RTT = stands for Round Trip Time. This is the amount of time in milliseconds that it took for the data to be sent from your computer to the remote computer and back to yours again. The smaller the value the faster the connection.

TTL = stands for Time To Live. The maximum number of hops (routers/gateways) that the packet can travel between your computer and the remote computer.

ADVANCED OPTIONS:

The following values are adjustable by clicking the more… button:

Time between Packets – Time in milliseconds (1000ms = 1 second). This is delay between ping attempts.

Packet Time Out – Time in milliseconds (1000ms = 1 second). This is the amount of time that should be allowed for a remote computer to respond.

Number of Packets to send – This is the total number of ping attempts. Setting this value to 0 will cause the program to continuously ping the remote computer until the stop button is clicked.

Quick Tip: To compare several servers in one session, simply enter another IP or Host Name in the Query Box and hit enter.  Click the stop button or (ctrl c) when you are done.  This will cause the program to retain all the ping results in a given session. This method only works when the Number of Packets to send value is set to 0.

Packet size in bytes – This is the amount of data that you wish to have sent to the remote server.