"Gareth Magennis" writes:

"Sam Goldwasser" wrote in message
...
OK, so here's the really strange problem dejour.

One day last week, my Internet access dropped out a couple times
(I have DSL). That's not totally unusual. But the next day, it
would only stay up for a couple minutes after booting and then was dead.

Swapped DSL modem - nothing.
Bypassed wireless router - nothing.

Figured, OK, so for some reason, the PC's on-board Ethernet port is dying.
Bought a PCI Ethernet card on eBay for $6 including shipping .

No change.

Then I discovered that it works fine locally. All PCs on my LAN,
wireless or direct, can talk to each other. But for some reason
this PC refuses to go out over the DSL modem. In fact, it won't even
talk to the DSL modem directly (if the Ethernet cable is plugged
into the model bypassing the router and entering the model URL),
but will talk to the router directly.

What the !@#$!@# is going on??? Virus? Some setting got corrupted?

Any info or thoughts appreciated.




Do you have Zone Alarm? A week or so ago after an automatic Microsoft
update, millions of computers could not access the net, including mine.
Some Zone Alarm firewall and MicroPants software issue.

If you have Zone Alarm, go to their website and there is info on fixes.

Thank you! That was exactly it. Even though I had disabled ZA the
first thing I tried and rebooted that way, it didn't help so I didn't
think ZA was the problem. But the interaction with MicroShaft software,
anything's possible! It seemed like updating ZA alone fixed the problem,
but I uninstalled the MS patch anyhow.

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