ml> ping sucks for diagnostics... use traceroute but understand that, 
ml> like ping, not all systems will respond... traceroute will get you 
ml> responses from systems in the path whereas ping doesn't and so 
ml> doesn't give any idea where the breakage may be...
 RN>  
 RN> From personal experience, I have to disagree with the above about
 RN> TRACERT. 

why disagree? i should think you would be agreeing because TRACERT
definitely showed where the breakage was... you were able to report it...
and it got fixed... ping cannot give the type of information necessary for
this...

 RN> In October of 2010 when everybody was having trouble with
 RN> a direct connect to me, in every instance I had various people
 RN> running that program and it ALWAYS hung at the same locale in the
 RN> path to here.  When I informed the $5 per hour geniuses at AT&T
 RN> what that address was and how often the traces stopped there, I
 RN> must have been (finally) speaking to someone with a modicum of
 RN> intellect because by the end of that month, the problem went away. 
 RN> I think some of you may remember that.  Those of you who do, let me
 RN> just say I couldn't have done it without you.

yes, i was one of those... more than once ;)

you are welcome for the assist :)

)\/(ark