Google introduced its Public DNS earlier this month. I can’t say there was a lot of fanfare over the new offering, but it does appear that people have been polarized in their opinions. Some believe it will add speed and security to browsing, others see privacy issues and yet other just see Big Brother around every corner. As with any new technological innovation, especially those introduced by über-tech companies like Google and Microsoft, there is a lot of FUD out there right now.
I have switched over my main desktop computer and my netbook to this public DNS server. My impressions (purely qualitative… not very scientific) are that this DNS is somewhat faster that using my ISP’s DNS server. This only stands to reason, as Google DNS does caching and prefetching of lookups. Typical DNS resolution involves, to some degree, searching from a top level domain (e.g. .com, .ca) and then working down until an authoritative resolution can be made.
Even though this does appear to be fast (to me anyway) I’m not ready to switch over some devices, like my Vonage VOIP adapter.
Learn more about Google’s Public DNS by visiting one of these sites (FUD free!)
- Introduction to Google’s Public DNS at Google Code
- Hands On with Google’s Public DNS at PC Mag
There’s also a response from Google’s only competitor in this space, OpenDNS.
Check them both out, give it a try and decide for yourself!
