Ann Elisabeth's blog

First of all, I edit the host file in Windows. Check Google for the locations of host files, depending on version of OS. It's useful to keep this edit for a while, to be able to access cpanel on both servers.

One line includes the IP number for the old webhost, with annelisabeth.com
The other line is the IP number for the new webhost, with www.annelisabeth.com.

This time I was too slow, and dns had already propagated to my ISP by the time I decided to make this change. I didn't have anything accessible to me on this computer, telling me what the old IP number was. And I still needed to access logs, make a final entry in the blog etc.

So I put on my thinking cap...

If you do a whois on your old webhost, and make a note of the whois server, you can try your domain on that same whois server. That's easy to do with advanced tools. That netted me my old dns servers.

THEN, the really neat trick is to configure one of those dns servers as YOUR dns server, and do a dig on your domain name. And up pops the old IP number.

Because, of course, you never tell your old host that you're moving until the move is complete and DNS has propagated. Of course, you need control over your domain name to do that, but all control freaks do that themselves anyway, right?

Geeks, you know what I'm talking about. Non geeks, I'm not going to explain, sorry. It's not that it's too complicated, it's just that you'll need to check out a tutorial and start on another level.
Here's as good a startpoint as any:
http://www.samspade.org/d/

Oh OK, I'll give you a link for DIG as well:

http://www.ip-plus.net/tools/dig_dns_set.en.html