DNS servfail error

Question

I am trying to move a hostname to my new VPS, which I completely new at. I am running CentOS with WHM/cPanel and am having problems with my DNS setup.

I have my own domain (richardbeddington.com) that I cannot seem to get to point to the IP I have setup for it on my WHM.

When running host or dig I am getting a SERVFAIL error. Although when I run

host -t ns richardbeddington.com

I can see the two nameservers that I've set it up to:

richardbeddington.com.  83448   IN  NS  ns2.vps-10.com.
richardbeddington.com.  83448   IN  NS  ns1.vps-10.com.

Now I don't know whether I should have it to some sort of local nameserver, or whether I should explicitly reference this domain in etc/resolve.conf, but some of the default domains that I have for this VPS (just some subdomains of the hosting company) don't seem to be setup in this way and work fine.

I have also run

dig +trace richardbeddington.com

on my server and it returns this:

; <<>> DiG 9.8.2rc1-RedHat-9.8.2-0.10.rc1.el6_3.6 <<>> +trace richardbeddington.com
;; global options: +cmd
.           85033   IN  NS  l.root-servers.net.
.           85033   IN  NS  e.root-servers.net.
.           85033   IN  NS  g.root-servers.net.
.           85033   IN  NS  b.root-servers.net.
.           85033   IN  NS  c.root-servers.net.
.           85033   IN  NS  i.root-servers.net.
.           85033   IN  NS  k.root-servers.net.
.           85033   IN  NS  a.root-servers.net.
.           85033   IN  NS  f.root-servers.net.
.           85033   IN  NS  d.root-servers.net.
.           85033   IN  NS  h.root-servers.net.
.           85033   IN  NS  j.root-servers.net.
.           85033   IN  NS  m.root-servers.net.
;; Received 449 bytes from 46.32.224.29#53(46.32.224.29) in 175 ms

com.            172800  IN  NS  k.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  f.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  e.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  j.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  i.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  m.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  g.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  l.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  d.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  b.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  h.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  c.gtld-servers.net.
com.            172800  IN  NS  a.gtld-servers.net.
;; Received 499 bytes from 192.5.5.241#53(192.5.5.241) in 1746 ms

richardbeddington.com.  172800  IN  NS  ns1.vps-10.com.
richardbeddington.com.  172800  IN  NS  ns2.vps-10.com.
;; Received 114 bytes from 192.26.92.30#53(192.26.92.30) in 100 ms

.           518400  IN  NS  a.root-servers.net.
.           518400  IN  NS  b.root-servers.net.
.           518400  IN  NS  c.root-servers.net.
.           518400  IN  NS  d.root-servers.net.
.           518400  IN  NS  e.root-servers.net.
.           518400  IN  NS  f.root-servers.net.
.           518400  IN  NS  g.root-servers.net.
.           518400  IN  NS  h.root-servers.net.
.           518400  IN  NS  i.root-servers.net.
.           518400  IN  NS  j.root-servers.net.
.           518400  IN  NS  k.root-servers.net.
.           518400  IN  NS  l.root-servers.net.
.           518400  IN  NS  m.root-servers.net.
;; BAD REFERRAL
;; Received 250 bytes from 79.170.40.3#53(79.170.40.3) in 16 ms

I think it may be an issue with the configuration of the local nameservers but I can't work it our.

If you need any other details obviously I can post them here.

Solution

I would check your zone file for richardbeddington.com on your current server. You said you're running WHM, so you should be able to login to WHM and go to the DNS records section. (Can't remember the exact location, but just put zone file or DNS in the search bar and you should find it.)

If I query ns1.vps-10.com or ns1.vps-10.com directly for richardbeddington.com, they report that there is no zone file for that domain:

~$ dig richardbeddington.com @ns1.vps-10.com

; <<>> DiG 9.8.1-P1 <<>> richardbeddington.com @ns1.vps-10.com
;; global options: +cmd
;; Got answer:
;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 42219
;; flags: qr rd; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 0, AUTHORITY: 13, ADDITIONAL: 0
;; WARNING: recursion requested but not available

;; QUESTION SECTION:
;richardbeddington.com.         IN      A

;; AUTHORITY SECTION:
.                       518400  IN      NS      a.root-servers.net.
.                       518400  IN      NS      b.root-servers.net.
.                       518400  IN      NS      c.root-servers.net.
.                       518400  IN      NS      d.root-servers.net.
.                       518400  IN      NS      e.root-servers.net.
.                       518400  IN      NS      f.root-servers.net.
.                       518400  IN      NS      g.root-servers.net.
.                       518400  IN      NS      h.root-servers.net.
.                       518400  IN      NS      i.root-servers.net.
.                       518400  IN      NS      j.root-servers.net.
.                       518400  IN      NS      k.root-servers.net.
.                       518400  IN      NS      l.root-servers.net.
.                       518400  IN      NS      m.root-servers.net.

;; Query time: 159 msec
;; SERVER: 79.170.40.2#53(79.170.40.2)
;; WHEN: Mon Jan 28 10:39:05 2013
;; MSG SIZE  rcvd: 250

So either there's a problem with the zone file, or the nameservers are misconfigured. If the zone file is correct, I would contact your host (or whoever manages your nameservers) and have them ensure it's properly pulling your zone file for that domain.

Comments

[James O'Gorman]

Are those two name servers definitely authoritative for the zone? They don't even respond to an SOA query.

[RichieAHB]

I've deleted the one on SU as I thought this was a better place for it

[DerfK]

Neither ns1.vps-10.com nor ns2.vps-10.com are resolving the hostname richardbeddington.com. They appear to be misconfigured, but to fix the issue we'd have to know what DNS server/version is on them, and how you set it up with the richardbeddington.com zone.

[RichieAHB]

@JamesO'Gorman to be honest I'm not sure. That was something I was curious about as the working domains on the server had an SOA reference in the trace at the point where the referral broke. How would I go about doing that? I'm sorry - I'm completely new to this!

[RichieAHB]

@DerfK I have my domain registrar pointing to these as the nameservers, the namerserver IPs in WHM are setup with these and the NS records in the richardbeddington.com zone are pointing to these. These were the nameservers that were configured as the nameservers by default in WHM.

[RichieAHB]

Thanks for your response. I've checked that and there is a zone file for that domain. I've gone on to the Nameserver IPs and I can see those two with the domains (79.170.40.2-3) and that they have five zones each, one of which is richardbeddington.com. Does that sound correct?

[RichieAHB]

As it turns out this was perfectly right - there was a very well hidden panel in my user area.