Pinging 127.x.x.x = pinging localhost (win-98) ?

[Nomen]

Is it normal that on win-98se, when you ping 127.x.x.x (where x.x.x could be *anything*) that you always end up pinging yourself (ie - the local machine) ?

I unplug my ethernet cable and I'm always able to ping 127.x.x.x.  My hosts file defines localhost as 127.0.0.3, and ipconfig sez my netmask is 255.255.0.0 (that's intentional on my part).  TCP/IP properties has my actual network IP hardcoded as 192.168.2.11.

Reason I ask is that I'm looking at the Personal Web Server logs and I'm seeing hits from 127.0.0.84 and wondering where the hell that's coming from.  I doubt that my LAN router is able to pass local traffic on anything other than 192.168.x.x.  127.0.0.84 must have originated from my own pc... ?
 

[jaclaz]

Quote

127.0.0.0/8 - This block is assigned for use as the Internet host
   loopback address.  A datagram sent by a higher level protocol to an
   address anywhere within this block should loop back inside the host.
   This is ordinarily implemented using only 127.0.0.1/32 for loopback,
   but no addresses within this block should ever appear on any network
   anywhere [RFC1700, page 5].

https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc3330

All in all I find it normal that pinging any address on 127.x.x.x loops back (the /8 is "class A" and corresponds to 255.0.0.0 netmask).

The source of your 127.0.0.84 port use is something that needs to be investigated, but should be unrelated.

jaclaz