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Chris76786777
Asked: 2014-10-10 15:41:22 +0800 CST

What would cause alternating "Request timed out." and "Destination host unreachable." when using ping command?

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I am pinging a Windows 8.1 PC that is currently shut down and I'm getting alternating results "Request timed out." and "Destination host unreachable."

What could cause this kind of behavior?

ping results

windows

2 Answers

  1. I don't know that the details are publicly documented anywhere, but in Windows Vista Microsoft altered the TCP/IP stack to generate "Destination host unreachable" messages when ARP doesn't complete. Windows XP and prior versions of Windows didn't have this behavior.

    (I'd love it if somebody would come along here and give a better answer that includes a link to some documentation at Microsoft explaining the rationale for this change!)

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  2. Are you pinging a PC on the local network? If you are on the same subnet as the remote device and there is no arp entry, the first 'timed out' is because your PC is trying to arp for the remote device and gets no answer, the next 3 are because of caching the lack of arp entry.

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