The boards woudln't let me respond to this thread: http://miataru.computing.net/windows2000/wwwboard/forum/57071.html But I see the need for the answer to be posted, so people searching Google don't go through the same rigamarole. posted below is my original response ~~~ I think I've found an answer. I've got a Windows 2000 SP4 PC that was doing the same thing; I troubleshot old drivers, configuration bindings -- TONS of stuff and I was on the verge of giving up after a week or two of troubleshooting this off and on. But it was *SO* simple, I literally smacked my forehead. Using Process Explorer [from Sysinternals] I found that services.exe was accessing the c:\winnt\system32\drivers\etc folder ... and what's in there? The HOSTS file. The person who used this PC before had created a custom HOSTS file that was about 178kb. As soon as I removed, renamed it or restored the original it works like a charm. I've yet to test this on XP, but I bet I'll encounter something similar. ~~~ Anyone else encounter adverse effects using modified HOSTS files?

Oh ! I thought you had put IPSec on, didn't think hosts would slow things down that much. I suppose on a P3 with 192 mb RAM, it would.