Why is the localhost entry missing in hosts file

localhosttcpipwindows-vista

I have had this problem twice (on two different computers), that the localhost entry is missing from the host file. How could this have happened?

The computer was installed with Windows Vista SP1, and I know Visual Studio 2008, SQL Server 2005 Express ed. and VMWare Player were installed on the computer. Never had probs with the first two before. Can it be the VMWare install?

EDIT: On the computers with this problem, there was an IPV6 entry of

::1 localhost

EDIT2: I just installed VMWare Player on a clean machine, and it didn't touch the hosts file.

Best Answer

I have just checked my Vista Business SP1 laptop and it does indeed have a localhost entry.

I also have vmware installed so seems unlikly culprit.

Have you checked for viruses/malware fiddling with your hosts file?

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How to copy a large file effectively

117GB/7H = 4.6MB/s

Something is wrong here.

Check for disk fragmentation, network misusage, another program grinding the drive or faulty hardware; Windows w/1Gb network can saturate the bandwidth that 7200 SATA drive can provide, i.e. 60-70 MB/s

I might also suggest that you create yourself a nice scheduled task to transfer the file(s) overnight.

/etc/hosts file being ignored

I found the problem.

The /etc/hosts file had overly restrictive permissions -rw------ (I believe that is 600 octal). Changing that to mode 644 fixed the problem.

My tests with ping were done with ordinary priv, and the hosts file was unreadable. My original problem was getting postgresql to startup properly; it starts with root privilege, but apparently sheds priv before starting its child processes for autovacuum and such, so by the time it needed a domain resolved, it could not read the hosts file.

Thanks to everybody who replied. It has been enlightening.

Best Answer

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