What is Dynamic DNS you might be asking? Basically, dynamic DNS is a service provided by third-party providers in which a clients’ constantly changing IP address is kept track of and DNS servers are updated with the new IP address automatically. If you have a broadband Internet connection, you more than likely have a dynamic IP address.

A dynamic IP address is one that changes every so often, as compared to a static IP address, which never changes. Normally, a changing IP address does not cause any significant problem until you try to connect to your home computer from outside of your home network. With a constantly changing IP address, you will never be able to find your computer on the Internet.

So why would you want to find your computer on the Internet in the first place? Well there are several reasons why it’s good to know your IP address:

1. Connect to your computer via Remote Desktop Connection and access your files

2. Stream audio and video from your home media server to any location in the world

3. Setup your own FTP server or web server on your home PC

There are many more reasons why it could be useful to know your IP address. So why doesn’t everyone have a static IP address? Well, it’s basically a lot cheaper forInternet service providers to keep rotating IP addresses to their clients. If you want a static IP address, you will have to pay an extra monthly charge.

Dynamic DNS

That’s where dynamic DNS comes into play. Using this service, you can theoretically create a static IP address for your home computer. Here’s how it works. When you visit any web site on the Internet, you can either type in the IP address or you can enter in the domain name, like Online-Tech-Tips.com. There are DNS servers all over the world that keep track of which names correspond to which numeric IP addresses.

When you come to Online-Tech-Tips.com, your Windows computer first looks up the IP address from a DNS server and then requests the site. This is great for servers that have static IP addresses that never change, but it’s not well-suited for servers that are on home broadband connections. This means that your server is constantly “moving” on the Internet and it messes up the one-to-one relationship between domain names and IP addresses.

The solution to setup dynamic DNS, whereby your server keeps track of what its current IP address is, and notifies the DNS provider whenever it changes. In this way, you can give your home computer or server a virtual static IP address. When connecting to your computer, you would either type in the domain name or you would ping the domain name to find the current IP address.

Image Source: Ars Technica

Here’s a quick overview of how dynamic DNS service works in a real example. The dynamic DNS client can be considered your home PC or server and the SOHO Firewall/NAT appliance is your cable modem or router.

How to setup Dynamic DNS

The cool thing is that there are free dynamic DNS services that you can use to set all of this up. My favorite by far is DynDNS, a free service which allows you to create a hostname that points to your dynamic IP or static IP address or URL.

Step 1: Create an account with DynDNS and then login with your username and password once you receive the authentication email.

Step 2: On the Account Services page, click on Add Host Services and then Add Dynamic DNS Host.

Step 3: You’ll get to pick from about 88 domain names, including blogdns.com, gotdns.com, is-a-geek.com, and more. Pick a domain name and then come up with a sub-domain, so you have a unique domain name like aseem.blogdns.com or akishore.is-a-geek.com. You will use this hostname to access your server or home computer. Leave the IP address field blank.

Step 4: Download the DynDNS client tool onto your computer or server. This piece of software is what will automatically check to see if your computer has a new IP address and if so, will notify the DNS servers of the new IP address. Always keep it running in the background and you’ll always be able to access your computer.

How this helps you to setup remote desktop even if you have a dynamic IP address or setup an FTP server or Web server. Enjoy!