Internet Explorer - Page cannot be displayed

[sharob]

IE 6 has stopped working.
I have a computer running XP SP2, with Office 2003 and it's Internet Explorer has stopped working. Any page you try to reach in IE comes up with the error - Page cannot be displayed.

WHAT DOES WORK.
Outlook Email - send and receive
Anti Virus Updates received.
External name resolution, trace route and ping on a dos console.

Internet connectivity is via ADSL Broadband and that has been restarted. Every other application can get external excet IE. Internet Firewall on XP has been enabled and disbaled - no change. Even tried adding IE to the allowed applications list.
So as a final Test I installed MSN Explorer - surfs the web brilliantly. All sites, Email everything.
Now before anyone tries to tell me to stick with MSN - can anyone tell me what I should look at to fix the IE problem. All the obvious things have been tried. I expect it is going to be something really silly. :suprised:

 

[sean.ferguson]

try downloading firefox and see if that one works, if it does then it might be possible that you have some sort of adware/malware affecting IE. however i will say that you should download firefox and try to use it as your primary browser, Im sure you have heard but Internet Explorer has many exploits available, some of which have just been discovered again recently. Firefox is a much faster and secure browser

 

[sharob]

I tried MSM Explorer to check to see if it was just IE or all Browsers. It's just IE. I'm 100% sure that Firefox will work and we may change to it later - but I would like to solve the actual problem if possible. I like to know what caused it.

 

[sean.ferguson]

Have you tried running Spybot or Adaware?
I cant remember if IE has this option but click on your file menu and see if there is a "work offline" option, make sure it is unselected if it is there. (usually there will be a small tick next to it if it is enabled.)
another thing to do is check your connection settings. Im pretty sure its in Internet Options. Sometimes and i dont know why but they manage to change themselves to a dialup connection settings, staying offline until they hear a dialtone or are told to connect... however with you being on ADSL it would never hear the connection.

Sorry i cant be of more help.

 

[sharob]

THat's the problem, all the obvious stuff has been checked. "Work Offline" was the first and the LAN Settings in Tools/Internet Options/Connections the next. No dialup configured and LAN settings default.
Also ran Adware and Antivirus. Might try spybot though - can't hurt.
Thanks for trying.
REP ++ anyway

 

[Khayman]

Try Spybot, it has been known to fix problems like this and sometimes catches thigns adaware doesn't

also have a look here http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;q293402
its for IE5, but may also apply

also
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;q241344

 

[American Zombie]

Internet Explorer Fix should be able to repair whatever is wrong.

 

[FreeWilly]

This IE problem has been cropping out a lot this past
week or so. Please post the results if you manage to
fix it.

Someone posted a problem slightly simmiliar to yours
in Windows General ( http://forum.osnn.net/showthread.php?t=50351 ).

 

[leedogg]

From my list of tweaks and fixes:

Reinstall/Repair IE & OE

To repair IE
Start/Run/regsvr32 urlmon.dll

OR

To reinstall IE
Start/run/rundll32.exe setupapi,InstallHinfSection DefaultInstall 132 c:\windows\inf\ie.inf

MS
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=KB;EN-US;Q318378&

 

[sharob]

We are giving these a try tonight to see what works. I'll keep you posted on the results.:nervous:

 

[sharob]

We are giving these a try tonight to see what works. I'll keep you posted on the results.:nervous:

Well, thanks all for your help but it all comes to nothing.
While I had my back turned he damn well formatted his C drive and reinstalled XP Pro. No I'll never know what actually happened!
He did mention that just before he did so, MSN Explorer stopped working and IE started to...... spooky. It's like a "last gasp" from an OS.