odd DNS failure in w2000?

[steve at horne.homelinux.net (steve at horne.homelinux.net)]

I have a wierd w2000 problem; I've dug around on the web
to answer it without luck.  

The Network is a rh6.2 firewall behins an attbi cable modem.
LAN has 2 linux boxes, 1 XP laptop, 1 W95, and a w2000 laptop.

The w2000 laptop is giving me fits. It's my wife's, I don't use it much,
so I don't know exactly what happened to cause the problem --

It no longer seems able to look up DNS info.

I can ping numerically anywhere on the web, and can access samba shares on the LAN.

I have set up the ip config/dns/netbios exactly as on the xp laptop which works fine.
(as does the w95 box).

oddly, putty to a local machine via ip address also fails.

The error is "unknown host".

Does the following output suggest what might be wrong?
Care to share a clue?

The only difference I see between the below and the output
on the XP is marked ===
below.

(Some of the things I've tried -- systematically trying all combinations
on the dns tab of the tcip properties screen; deleting/reinstalling
the tcpip protocol, rebooting uncounted times.)

It's probably some trivial blunder, but I can't seem to find it.



Thanks, Steve

C:\>nslookup -d2
------------
SendRequest(), len 38
    HEADER:
        opcode = QUERY, id = 1, rcode = NOERROR
        header flags:  query, want recursion
  ===   header flags:  query, want recursion, recursion available ==
        questions = 1,  answers = 0,  authority records = 0,  additional = 0

    QUESTIONS:
        1.2.2.4.in-addr.arpa, type = PTR, class = IN

------------
socket (dg) failed: No error
SendRequest failed
*** Can't find server name for address 4.2.2.1: No response from server
------------



SendRequest(), len 45
    HEADER:
        opcode = QUERY, id = 2, rcode = NOERROR
        header flags:  query, want recursion
        questions = 1,  answers = 0,  authority records = 0,  additional = 0

    QUESTIONS:
        79.227.148.216.in-addr.arpa, type = PTR, class = IN

------------
socket (dg) failed: No error
SendRequest failed
*** Can't find server name for address 216.148.227.79: No response from server
------------
SendRequest(), len 45
    HEADER:
        opcode = QUERY, id = 3, rcode = NOERROR
        header flags:  query, want recursion
        questions = 1,  answers = 0,  authority records = 0,  additional = 0

and so forth.