Unable to connect to google, netbank, some other sites

[Dan]

I have an ~3 year old Gateway 1100 athlon with 2 hdd's, each running
independent installations of win2k in a dual boot setup. I have a 2meg
cable connection. Beginning this morning, I have not been able to get on
google, www.netbank.com, and various other sites from other operating
system. I am able to get on most sites I try, Ebay for example. I run IE,
as well as Firefox & Mozilla. None of the browsers can connect to the
affected sites. My ISP (wideopenwest) ran through some very basic steps
such as setting all the IE settings to their minimum defaults (security,
privacy, etc) and still nogo on these sites. I have disabled my firewall
(Norton Internet Security 2002) to no avail. They tell me that's all they
can do, I'll have to call Gateway. Still it seems to me this is probably an
ISP problem. Given that it happens on both hdd's, and is present with no
firewall, I can't imagine what on my pc could be the problem. Any
suggestions appreciated.

Dan

 

[Frank Saunders, MS-MVP]

I have an ~3 year old Gateway 1100 athlon with 2 hdd's, each running
independent installations of win2k in a dual boot setup. I have a
2meg cable connection. Beginning this morning, I have not been able
to get on google, www.netbank.com, and various other sites from other
operating system. I am able to get on most sites I try, Ebay for
example. I run IE, as well as Firefox & Mozilla. None of the
browsers can connect to the affected sites. My ISP (wideopenwest)
ran through some very basic steps such as setting all the IE settings
to their minimum defaults (security, privacy, etc) and still nogo on
these sites. I have disabled my firewall (Norton Internet Security
2002) to no avail. They tell me that's all they can do, I'll have to
call Gateway. Still it seems to me this is probably an ISP problem.
Given that it happens on both hdd's, and is present with no firewall,
I can't imagine what on my pc could be the problem. Any suggestions
appreciated.

Dan

First eliminate any scumware.
See
Dealing with Unwanted Spyware, Parasites, Toolbars and Search Engines
http://mvps.org/winhelp2002/unwanted.htm

Note that AdAware and SpyBot S & D will each catch some things the other
won't. Also, each needs to be updated before every use, even when just
downloaded. There's also a lot more to do than just those two programs.
CWShredder is also available here:
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/regs_edits/cwshredder.zip
**Post your HijackThis log to
http://forums.spywareinfo.com/ or the Spyware forum at
http://forum.aumha.org/ for expert analysis, not here.**
Alternative download pages for Ad-Aware, Spybot, HijackThis and CWShredder
may be found on this page:
http://aumha.org/a/parasite.htm.
If trying everything at that site does not fix the problem please post back
in the same thread.

--
Frank Saunders, MS-MVP, IE/OE
Please respond in Newsgroup. Do not send email
http://www.fjsmjs.com
Protect your PC
http://www.microsoft.com/security/protect/

 

[Dan]

As a follow-up to this, I've just discovered I cannot get on my ISP's news
server, although I can get on the same groups from other servers. Sorry if
this isn't the absolute most appropriate group for this particular problem,
I usually would post such questions on PCGUIDE.COM, but naturally it's one
of the sites I cannot access!

Dan

 

[Dan]

Thanks Frank, I do have both spybot SD & adaware, I actually ran adaware
last night but will run both again.

Dan

 

[Dan]

I have run Spybot SD (not the most recent reg file, since I could not
connect to the server, however I believe the file used is no more than 1
week old) Adaware (most recent file) CW Shredder & Hijack this; all were
negative. Thinking it might be an ISP DNS problem, I have also tried
entering the addresses of several of the offending sites directly into the
browser (e.g., 64.233.161.104 for Google, 199.105.175.70 for Netbank.com,
another site I can't reach, & a couple others) and I still cannot reach
them. Any further ideas appreciated, particularly any way I can tell for
certain if the trouble is my PC or not, without having to try another pc at
this location, since I don't have access to one.

Thanks,

Dan

 

[Frank Saunders, MS-MVP]

I have run Spybot SD (not the most recent reg file, since I could not
connect to the server, however I believe the file used is no more
than 1 week old) Adaware (most recent file) CW Shredder & Hijack
this; all were negative. Thinking it might be an ISP DNS problem, I
have also tried entering the addresses of several of the offending
sites directly into the browser (e.g., 64.233.161.104 for Google,
199.105.175.70 for Netbank.com, another site I can't reach, & a
couple others) and I still cannot reach them. Any further ideas
appreciated, particularly any way I can tell for certain if the
trouble is my PC or not, without having to try another pc at this
location, since I don't have access to one.

Thanks,

Dan

Check for a file named HOSTS with no extension (not Hosts.sam). It may be a
hidden file. Open it with Notepad and remove any line referencing the site.
Or, rename HOSTS to OLDHOSTS

--
Frank Saunders, MS-MVP, IE/OE
Please respond in Newsgroup. Do not send email
http://www.fjsmjs.com
Protect your PC
http://www.microsoft.com/security/protect/

 

[Dan]

Thanks Frank, found the files, one on each HDD in WINNT\system32\drivers\etc
(again, dual boot dual win2k) only entry is "127.0.0.1 localhost". Recently
installed Hotmail Hopper, this is the server address it uses, the only other
time I've seen it.

If this is not an ISP/network issue, what system/portion of a pc could
possibly cause this to happen simultaneoulsy on BOTH independant win2k
installs of this dual hdd/dual boot setup?

Dan

 

[Frank Saunders, MS-MVP]

Thanks Frank, found the files, one on each HDD in
WINNT\system32\drivers\etc (again, dual boot dual win2k) only entry
is "127.0.0.1 localhost". Recently installed Hotmail Hopper, this is
the server address it uses, the only other time I've seen it.

If this is not an ISP/network issue, what system/portion of a pc could
possibly cause this to happen simultaneoulsy on BOTH independant win2k
installs of this dual hdd/dual boot setup?

Dan

I really don't know.

Did you post your HijackThis log?
Go to: http://mvps.org/winhelp2002/unwanted.htm
Download "Hijack This!" [freeware]

Unzip, double-click "HijackThis.exe" and Press "Scan".

When the scan is finished, the "Scan" button will change into a "Save Log"
button.
Click: "Save Log" (generates: "hijackthis.log")

Next, go to the below location:
http://www.spywareinfo.com/forums/

Sign in, go to the "Spyware and Hijackware Removal" section.
Press "New Topic", copy and paste hijackthis.log into your new message.

--
Frank Saunders, MS-MVP, IE/OE
Please respond in Newsgroup. Do not send email
http://www.fjsmjs.com
Protect your PC
http://www.microsoft.com/security/protect/

 

[Dan]

I can't get to the mvps.org site, but I can get on the spywareinfo one. I
looked over the hijackthis log, it was short (I try to keep background crap
to a minimum) & nothing there looked suspicious, however I will post it to
the latter site.

If that doesn't lead to something, I don't know whether to grab a "free"
trial copy of AOL to see if I can reach these sites (indicating it's the
ISP), or wipe both HDD's & start over. Don't know for sure, but It seems as
thought the % of sites I can't reach is growing by the minute...

Thanks,

Dan

 

[Frank Saunders, MS-MVP]

I can't get to the mvps.org site, but I can get on the spywareinfo
one. I looked over the hijackthis log, it was short (I try to keep
background crap to a minimum) & nothing there looked suspicious,
however I will post it to the latter site.

If that doesn't lead to something, I don't know whether to grab a
"free" trial copy of AOL to see if I can reach these sites
(indicating it's the ISP), or wipe both HDD's & start over. Don't
know for sure, but It seems as thought the % of sites I can't reach
is growing by the minute...

Thanks,

Dan

I don't have any more suggestions. Sorry.

--
Frank Saunders, MS-MVP, IE/OE
Please respond in Newsgroup. Do not send email
http://www.fjsmjs.com
Protect your PC
http://www.microsoft.com/security/protect/

 

[H Leboeuf]

If applicable look at some of the switches of this tool.

IPCONFIG Diagnostic Utility: Parameters and Usage
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=117662 (W2000/NT 5/6/2003)