Recently my computer has decided to stop accessing MSN messenger, and even hotmail via the direct web address. To correct this, i attempted to update windows, and the update program was sluggish to say the least, sometimes not connecting at all. The main gripe is a game called lineage 2 wont connect fully. I can log in, lkoad the characters, and connect to the game world, but ocne this has oaded, the world mapp is shown with my character, but there is no confirmed connect message, and no inputs will be accepted at all for the character, nor any other PC displayed onscreen. Downloads still function correctly most of the time, and normal web browsing is possible. There has been no recent installs beyond 2 games which did not function correctly, XCom apocalypse, and nations fighter command, both old games. I did an Fdisk, and installed my old OS, 2000 professional, but the same error is occuring, even though i have only installed a few windows security updates (very laborious when 1 in 4 downlaods fail) and all of the hardware. No errors are reported anywhere i cans ee, and i can access hotmail from other computers on the network, as well as longin to MSN, and the windows update site. Any help would be gratefully received.

prob a ethernet card problem! Try replacing it...ther cheap like less then 10 bucks if u shop arond...also check that u dont have any fire wall software enabled Duct Tape is like the Force, It has a light side and a dark side and it holds the world together!

I was hoping it wouldnt be that! Its on the motherboard, an Epox 8RDA3 (I i think, might be +, not on that machine right now). Ill check it out over the weekend, ive got a spare card in a different machine,and report back but thanks. The firewalls have no effect as to what i can connect to if theyre totally sqitched off, so i think it might be a port failure (not sure if thats even possible, im not too knowlegable on technical jargon)

Try removing the TCP/IP settings from the nic and then activating it again. This is much like a reboot of the network. Perhaps your firewall (or lack of) is what needs to be looked at. J. j e r u v y a t y a h o o d o t c o m

Ok, Ive changed over the network card, and the results are the same with some notable improvements in the updates. Still no access to MSN or hotmail though. There were no real complications, and the new card is a linksys etherPCI II driven Winbond W89C940, and the new Win2000 OS picked it up and could access the internet as before with no changes to the default install. Is there something im missing here? I dont understand how something like this could occur, it appears hardware based, but the new card should have changed that. If it was software based the FDisk should have changed that, and no settings were changed on the host computer. Anyone have any clues as to what ive done to destroy my net access.

At this stage your going to have to determine what the fault is, or how bad the fault is. Since you've replaced nic's you note that this is unlikely a hardware problem. So, first of all if you are connected like so.. Computer --> Router --> ISP Modem --> Internet Each of these will have an IP address (we'll ignore the ISP Modem since thats a bit advanced) and once we leave our network for the internet we'll check the nameservers and gateway directly for access. If you do not have a router then just ignore this step. On your computer bring up a command prompt and type 'IPCONFIG /ALL' This will give you all the information to troubleshoot. First off it will give you an IP address. Ping this address with 'PING x.x.x.x' This should work. If this doesn't then you've got some serious networking problems. Next look for 'Default Gateway' and ping this address. Again this must work, or there are serious problems. Next get your nameserver and ping the nameserver. Now if you have a router you may have gateway and nameserver set to the routers address (ie: 192.168.1.1) so ping this, if this doesn't work try unplugging the router for about 10 seconds and plugging it back in, wait another minute and try again. Now try to ping a couple real websites you know. I prefer www.yahoo.com and www.google.com. Now try to ping www.microsoft.com and www.msn.com. When do you start having problems? J.

The diagram for network setup is a little different to how ive got the home network setup. Client -> Hub -> Host -> Modem to cable connection Im not technically proficient in the naming stakes, so these may be incorrect. The client computer is having problems accessing MSN, Hotmail etc, as described earlier, but doing the Ipconfig and ping, comes up with responses from google.com and all of the internet gateway and IPs requested. The host computer and the client computer get no response from hotmail.com, msn.com, ebay.com, microsoft.com. Although the host computer can access all of these sites. Im entirely confused as to what would cause these problems, as these results appear to indicate a problem with my hardware. Perhaps the hub is damaged? Ill run a test by hooking the client directly into the net (not through the hub and host) and see if it works correctly then.