Custom hosts file, standard OS level cache, on network (sometimes), router hacked to use openDNS (it seems to be a new trick of ISPs to stop DNS changing so I had to hack it back to the base model).
For portable machines I will tend to add openDNS to their DNS server lists depending on how/where the machine is used (having to run through network config over the phone/email is not as fun as it sounds) and while I rarely use it I do have a fallback DNS on a remote server I look after that more or less mirrors my home machines. Unless I am playing with it then it is only internet facing if I SSH into that machine, launch the daemon, telnet from there into the network router there and sort it all out).
That one is more of a one for associates when visiting countries that dislike such things though.
