I am currently running a Windows 7, 64-bit machine and had noticed lately that I could not access localhost using Google Chrome, but never really took the time to look into it. Finally I decided to dig a bit deeper. After some searching I stumbled on this link regarding the HOSTS file, which, not being my problem, prompted me to take a peek at it. Below are the relevant lines :
# localhost name resolution is handled within DNS itself. # 127.0.0.1 localhost # ::1 localhost
Dargh!
Uncommenting the IPv4 entry solved my problem
# localhost name resolution is handled within DNS itself. 127.0.0.1 localhost # ::1 localhost
I had noticed that comment in the distant past but did not think much about it. My fix here may yield future problems so one should keep that in mind, the reasons why and a discussion regarding why this change was made to the HOSTS file can be found here.