easyMultiple Choice
220-1201 Practice Question: A customer reports that their laptop can connect…
A customer reports that their laptop can connect to the internet via a wired connection but cannot access any network shares or printers by hostname. They can ping the IP address of the file server. Which network service is most likely misconfigured?
⚠ Common exam trap
Many exam-takers confuse DNS with DHCP, thinking that DHCP provides name resolution, but DHCP only provides the address of the DNS server—it does not perform the actual hostname-to-IP translation.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
DNS
The user can ping the file server by IP address, which confirms that basic IP connectivity (Layer 3) is working. However, they cannot access network shares or printers by hostname, which indicates that the system cannot resolve those hostnames to IP addresses. DNS (Domain Name System) is the service responsible for translating hostnames to IP addresses, so a misconfigured DNS server or client DNS settings would cause exactly this symptom.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
DHCP
Why it's wrong here
DHCP assigns IP addresses, gateways and DNS servers; if it were misconfigured, the laptop would likely lack an address or DNS entirely, yet it pings the server's IP fine. DHCP is the right answer when clients cannot obtain addresses or reach any network at all.
- ✓
DNS
Why this is correct
Name resolution fails while IP connectivity succeeds, so the fault lies in the service mapping hostnames to IP addresses. DNS is misconfigured or unreachable, preventing resolution of file server and printer names even though ICMP to the server's address works.
- ✗
NAT
Why it's wrong here
NAT translates private addresses to public ones for internet egress; it plays no part in resolving internal hostnames. The laptop already reaches the internet and pings the server by IP, so NAT is functioning. NAT would be the culprit if outbound internet access failed while internal addressing worked.
- ✗
ARP
Why it's wrong here
ARP resolves IPv4 addresses to MAC addresses on the local subnet; it plays no part in mapping hostnames to IP addresses, so name resolution would still fail. It is tempting because ARP faults do break connectivity, and it would be the correct suspect if the server were unreachable by IP address as well as by hostname.
Visual reference
Go deeper
Related to this question
Learn chapter
IPv4 Address Classes and Ranges
Key term
Domain Name System
The Domain Name System (DNS) is the internet's phonebook that translates human-friendly domain names like google.com into computer-friendly IP addresses like 172.217.0.46.
Key term
Name Server
A name server is a specialized server that translates human-readable domain names into machine-readable IP addresses so that computers can find each other on a network.
About these practice questions
One of 871 original 220-1201 practice questions on Courseiva, each with a full explanation and wrong-answer analysis — not exam dumps or protected exam content. Learn why practice questions differ from exam dumps →
JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This 220-1201 practice question is part of Courseiva's free CompTIA certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the 220-1201 exam.