Hi. For a long time I am puzzled why, when internet connection is gone (beyond first router, outside of subnet) SSH (and telnet?) connection is drastically slowed. Same behavior, but less impacted is observed when system boots without working internet connection, and I am not sure, but I think even access to SAMBA fileshares can be/is affected. Affected systems are mostly production servers, and too spaced apart in time to be able to point a finger in something I am doing wrong. I have not had time to gather more facts, I always forget/don;t have time, so I will only focus on definite SSH issue on CentOS 6.3, although I have seen same with 5.x. 1 server in question is set in following maner: [root at chiron ~]# cat /etc/networks default 0.0.0.0 loopback 127.0.0.0 link-local 169.254.0.0 [root at chiron ~]# cat /etc/sysconfig/network NETWORKING=yes NTPSERVERARGS=iburst HOSTNAME=chiron.example.com [root at chiron ~]# cat /etc/hosts 127.0.0.1 localhost localhost.localdomain localhost4 localhost4.localdomain4 chiron.example.com chiron ::1 localhost localhost.localdomain localhost6 localhost6.localdomain6 chiron.example.com chiron Does it have anything to do with /etc/hosts file not having row with used IP address, or is problem somewhere else? Searching the net gives too much irrelevant links, and all I need it to be pointed in the right direction. -- Ljubomir Ljubojevic (Love is in the Air) PL Computers Serbia, Europe Google is the Mother, Google is the Father, and traceroute is your trusty Spiderman... StarOS, Mikrotik and CentOS/RHEL/Linux consultant