IE in XP cannot connect to Windows Updates page

[H. S.]

I am helping install a new Dell Inspiron 5160 that came with Windows XP
Home Edition. The user bought XP Pro Upgrade from his uninversity and
asked me to partition his hard disk and install Pro.

I uninstalled the earlier OS (Home edition) becuase it wasn't allowing
me to resize/create new partitions. And then clean installed XP Pro.

Now right after intallation, note that *nothing* has been done yet, only
a couple of users have been created, I used the Dell driver's CD to
install the driver for the network card. Then connected the CAT5 cable
from my home network to the laptop and tried to do windows update by
going to windowsupdates.microsoft.com.

IE reported "page cannot be displayed" and just couldn't access or
connect to the updates page. It also failed to connect to the
microsoft.com main page.

I read though many messages and also called Dell Tech support (!) but
haven't been successful yet. I have tried to delete the iuengine.dll and
another dll file, removing cookies, deleting temporary files and
clearing history and even renaming the catrock2 (or something similar)
file in c:\windows\system32. Also tried changing the security settings
to Low and also allowing all cookies. IE simply cannot see the above
sites (also hotmail.com). Other than these, all site work okay e.g.
www.google.com, www.yahoo.com, etc.

Suggestions please?
->HS
Sorry for crossposting, but couldn't really categorize the problem (not
sure where exactly the problem is

 

[Andre Da Costa]

Did you run the network Wizard?

See links about networking:
http://www.microsoft.com/WindowsXP/pro/using/howto/networking/ics.asp
http://www.microsoft.com/resources/...l/proddocs/en-us/hnw_component_overvieww.mspx

Andre

 

[H. S.]

Apparently, _Andre Da Costa_, on 10/14/04 20:19,typed:

Did you run the network Wizard?

See links about networking:
http://www.microsoft.com/WindowsXP/pro/using/howto/networking/ics.asp
http://www.microsoft.com/resources/...l/proddocs/en-us/hnw_component_overvieww.mspx

No. er.. but I don't see why I should. I connect to the internet through
a router. This computer in questions is connected to the router with a
CAT5 cable. I gets an IP address and subnet mask from the router (which
is also a DHCP server).

->HS

 

[Hans-Georg Michna]

Now right after intallation, note that *nothing* has been done yet, only
a couple of users have been created, I used the Dell driver's CD to
install the driver for the network card. Then connected the CAT5 cable
from my home network to the laptop and tried to do windows update by
going to windowsupdates.microsoft.com.

Wrong URL. The correct one is: windowsupdate.microsoft.com

IE reported "page cannot be displayed" and just couldn't access or
connect to the updates page. It also failed to connect to the
microsoft.com main page.

Please check http://www.michna.com/kb/wxnet.htm for the solution
if this problem persists.

Hans-Georg

 

[H. S.]

Apparently, _Hans-Georg Michna_, on 10/15/04 04:57,typed:

Wrong URL. The correct one is: windowsupdate.microsoft.com




Please check http://www.michna.com/kb/wxnet.htm for the solution
if this problem persists.

Hans-Georg

Thanks. I just did that but either I missed something or just couldn't
find anything relevant. However, I made some other progress.

In our apartment we have a small home network. There is a Linux machine
which is the router and though which we share one high speed connection.
I am connecting from my laptop to that machine (through a switch). Since
I was having problems browsing to only windows updates sites and
microsoft sites, I tried connection my laptop directly to the ISP'
modem. IT worked and I was able to update my laptop without any
difficulty. After updating everthing, I disconnected and let them
reestablish the connection though the Linux machine. I again tried
accessing the windows updates site from inside the network hoping that
the updates might have helped, but obtianed exactly the same behavior.
So it seems it has something to do with the firewall at the router.

Do we need to open any specific ports in our firewalls to make windows
updates work?

->S

 

[Hans-Georg Michna]

Apparently, _Hans-Georg Michna_, on 10/15/04 04:57,typed:

//www.michna.com/kb/wxnet.htm[/URL] for the solution
if this problem persists.

Thanks. I just did that but either I missed something or just couldn't
find anything relevant. However, I made some other progress.

When there's nothing wrong with the computer, then the page
can't find anything. -)

In our apartment we have a small home network. There is a Linux machine
which is the router and though which we share one high speed connection.
I am connecting from my laptop to that machine (through a switch). Since
I was having problems browsing to only windows updates sites and
microsoft sites, I tried connection my laptop directly to the ISP'
modem. IT worked and I was able to update my laptop without any
difficulty. After updating everthing, I disconnected and let them
reestablish the connection though the Linux machine. I again tried
accessing the windows updates site from inside the network hoping that
the updates might have helped, but obtianed exactly the same behavior.
So it seems it has something to do with the firewall at the router.

Do we need to open any specific ports in our firewalls to make windows
updates work?

Yes, port 443.

For a quick test whether that's it, try to telnet to
secure.site.com on port 443. If you get an unreachable error,
port 443 is being blocked.

So if you type

telnet site.com 443

(no http ot https, just the site's name.com), you should get an
error if it's not reachable. If you just get a blinking cursor,
open another dos window and enter the command: NETSTAT

You should see a connection on 'https' similar to the following:

netstat

Active Connections

Proto Local Address Foreign Address State
....
TCP suitcase:1111 123.123.123.123:https
ESTABLISHED <--- this is the connection you just opened
....

This will tell you if PORT 443 used for SSL (used to get to
HTTPS secured sites) is being blocked or not.

Hans-Georg

 

[H. S.]

The problem below was solved by changing the MTU of the client from 1500
to 1492. I was connecting it through a router which was connected to an
ADSL modem. In pppoe cases, MTU cannot be 1500 IIRC, even not more than
1492.

Thanks for all those who tried to help,
->HS


Apparently, _H. S._, on 14/10/04 19:51,typed:

 

[Hans-Georg Michna]

The problem below was solved by changing the MTU of the client from 1500
to 1492. I was connecting it through a router which was connected to an
ADSL modem. In pppoe cases, MTU cannot be 1500 IIRC, even not more than
1492.

Thanks for all those who tried to help,
->HS

HS,

you're welcome. I'm glad that http://www.michna.com/kb/wxnet.htm
once more pinpointed the problem perfectly and showed the
solution, even though I didn't recognize it from afar.

Hans-Georg

 

[H. S.]

Apparently, _Hans-Georg Michna_, on 17/10/04 05:33,typed:

HS,

you're welcome. I'm glad that http://www.michna.com/kb/wxnet.htm
once more pinpointed the problem perfectly and showed the
solution, even though I didn't recognize it from afar.

Hans-Georg

Actually, I tried that page and as I had said earlier it didn't help me
at all in this particular case. What helpe me was when I was checking
what was the configurations of other machine in my home network that was
able to access the sites I couldn't from this WinXP machine. Since I
wasn't even looking for MTU settings at that time, I now realized it
would have been almost impossible to know about the problem since
Windows XP doesn't report MTU setting directly in ipconfig. I used a
Linux Live CD and noticed that I was using MTU of 1500 whereas the other
computer was using a lower value when I compare it's eth0 (network card
0)'s settings. And bang, there was the solution.

Next I just had to find out how to make Winows XP to change it's default
MTU of 1500. I used the method from here of editing the registry key:
http://www.winguides.com/registry/display.php/280/

This information is here so that it may be helpful to some other poor
soul like me who is having this weird problem.

->HS

 

[Torgeir Bakken \(MVP\)]

Actually, I tried that page and as I had said earlier it didn't help me
at all in this particular case. What helpe me was when I was checking
what was the configurations of other machine in my home network that was
able to access the sites I couldn't from this WinXP machine. Since I
wasn't even looking for MTU settings at that time, I now realized it
would have been almost impossible to know about the problem since
Windows XP doesn't report MTU setting directly in ipconfig. I used a
Linux Live CD and noticed that I was using MTU of 1500 whereas the other
computer was using a lower value when I compare it's eth0 (network card
0)'s settings. And bang, there was the solution.

Next I just had to find out how to make Winows XP to change it's default
MTU of 1500. I used the method from here of editing the registry key:
http://www.winguides.com/registry/display.php/280/

This information is here so that it may be helpful to some other poor
soul like me who is having this weird problem.

Hi

Here is a pretty good article on this MTU issue:

How to Troubleshoot Black Hole Router Issues
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=314825


E.g. if Windows Update reports error 0x80072EE2, wrong MTU size can
be the cause sometimes.

 

[jeffrey]

Hi,

I have my MTU setting at 1450, when using ADSL with a router, it didn`t like
the setting hire than 1450. If I had it set higher, some websites wouldn`t
load and Windows Update wouldn`t work either.

Jeff

 

[Hans-Georg Michna]

Apparently, _Hans-Georg Michna_, on 17/10/04 05:33,typed:

Actually, I tried that page and as I had said earlier it didn't help me
at all in this particular case.

It solves your problem perfectly. After you fill in the form, it
shows you precisely that your problem may be related to the MTU
and how to solve this problem.

Whether you accept or ignore the advice is another question. But
of course it is very important for me to find out why the advice
was not accepted.

If you have any indication that the page doesn't actually help,
I would be very grateful if you copied the selections line just
above the three buttons and posted it here.

Hans-Georg

 

[H. S.]

Apparently, _Hans-Georg Michna_, on 18/10/04 05:36,typed:

It solves your problem perfectly. After you fill in the form, it
shows you precisely that your problem may be related to the MTU
and how to solve this problem.

Whether you accept or ignore the advice is another question. But
of course it is very important for me to find out why the advice
was not accepted.

If you have any indication that the page doesn't actually help,
I would be very grateful if you copied the selections line just
above the three buttons and posted it here.

Hans-Georg

Yes, you are right. I tried again and this time it does explain what the
problem is. As I had mentioned in one of my earlier messages, I did go
through the page and probably didn't look carefully. Note that at that
time I was already a day and a half into debugging this thing and it was
driving me nuts maybe at that time I missed one of the radio button
choices.

So for others, this particular problem is indeed described in the page
Hans mentioned (though you have to read a lot, or at least go through a
lot of material). Nice page there!

regards,
->HS

 

[Hans-Georg Michna]

Apparently, _Hans-Georg Michna_, on 18/10/04 05:36,typed:

Yes, you are right. I tried again and this time it does explain what the
problem is. As I had mentioned in one of my earlier messages, I did go
through the page and probably didn't look carefully. Note that at that
time I was already a day and a half into debugging this thing and it was
driving me nuts maybe at that time I missed one of the radio button
choices.

So for others, this particular problem is indeed described in the page
Hans mentioned (though you have to read a lot, or at least go through a
lot of material). Nice page there!

HS,

thanks a lot for confirming. My hope is that after filling in
the form on http://www.michna.com/kb/wxnet.htm, you don't have
to read through all those 40 pages. Instead you should only see
the relevant chapters.

As soon as you click on the form selections, most of the
chapters are closed and only the hits remain open.

But anyway, problem solved. Glad to hear that.

Hans-Georg