Member Avatar for ear4aak

Hi,

Just setting up another computer with XP.
Just spent the last few days downloading SP2 (via dial up, so very slow!).
Everything to do with internet explorer was working fine yesterday
Just installed SP2 this morning and now we're hitting problems!
Can conect to the internet fine and browse for 5mins or so, and then get hit by the dreaded DNS... error with the other error of "internet explorer could not open the search page" when typing in a new url.

Had a little browse through previous posts namely:
http://www.daniweb.com/techtalkforums/thread17479.html
and installed the update suggested there.

But still getting the same problems!

Can anyone help?

Adrian

<this computers only going to be a basic computer for the parents and i'm tempted to just unistall SP2! unless theres a quick and simple solution lurking out there somewhere! :?: >

<forgot to say first time that computer has antivirus, adaware, spybot all installed and up to date. all is fine!>

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Dani AI

Generated

The symptoms you describe — IE working briefly after boot, then DNS failures and the "Internet Explorer could not open the search page" message — most often point to a corrupted protocol stack or an LSP/Winsock problem that surfaced after the SP2 networking/security changes. SP2 changed how Windows handles networking and firewalls, and that can expose leftover hooks from old network software, security tools, or incomplete malware cleanup. is on the right track calling out Winsock/TCP problems, and is right to ask for the exact error text when it reappears.

A practical, safe troubleshooting order that avoids uninstalling SP2:

  • First isolate DNS vs raw connectivity: try loading a site by its numeric IP and try another browser to see if the failure is IE-specific. Also temporarily disable any third‑party firewall/Internet‑security tool for a quick test.
  • Reset the Windows network stack (make a System Restore point first). On XP SP2 you can reset Winsock and the TCP/IP stack with the built‑in netsh commands; then reboot and retest:
netsh winsock reset
netsh int ip reset
  • If that doesn’t hold, reinstall the network adapter driver (use the vendor OEM driver), check the adapter’s DNS entries and proxy settings, and inspect Event Viewer for related errors.

If the problem still returns, collect the exact error text, the full network configuration and Event Viewer entries and post them here so the fault can be narrowed further. Do not rush to uninstall SP2 — it fixes important security issues — but do test with SP2 plus only Windows’ own networking stack active (third‑party firewalls disabled) to confirm whether a compatibility layer is at fault.

Recommended Answers

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Member Avatar for Peter Mugizi

next time the error message comes up, write down the exact error, go to www.microsoft.com and search the error.. u will get a solution...

Hi,

Just setting up another computer with XP.
Just spent the last few days downloading SP2 (via dial up, so very slow!).
Everything to do with internet explorer was working fine yesterday
Just installed SP2 this morning and now we're hitting problems!
Can conect to the internet fine and browse for 5mins or so, and then get hit by the dreaded DNS... error with the other error of "internet explorer could not open the search page" when typing in a new url.

Had a little browse through previous posts namely:

http://www.daniweb.com/techtalkforums/thread17479.html[/url]
and installed the update suggested there.

But still getting the same problems!

Can anyone help?

Adrian

This computers only going to be a basic computer for the parents and i'm tempted to just unistall SP2! unless theres a quick and simple solution lurking out there somewhere! :?:

PS Forgot to say first time that computer has antivirus, adaware, spybot all installed and up to date. all is fine!

Edited by TrustyTony because: fixed formatting
Member Avatar for ear4aak

Already done that, with no luck! :-|

I think that I may have sorted the problem, but I'm not sure how!
Thought that I sorted the problem earlier :) (after spending all day changing settings), but then it came back again :sad:

I've now "sorted" it again, hoping that it doesn't come back! (time will tell!)

I'll keep you posted! :-|

Member Avatar for ear4aak

Problems back!!!
Haven't managed to to sort it afterall!

Really tempted to just unistall SP2!

Any suggestions before I do?
:eek:

Member Avatar for dlh6213

Try winsockfix from here:

http://www.digitalminds.net/index.pl/downloads

If it still doesn't work, go to Start, Run, type in cmd, and click OK.

Type in ipconfig/release and then ipconfig/renew

Try your connection again; if it still doesn't work, go back to cmd, type in ipconfig/all and post the information that comes up.

You may want to have a look at post #5 in this thread as well:

http://www.daniweb.com/techtalkforums/thread17684-winsockfix.html

Member Avatar for HBB

download the file file and run it ... dont waste time reading microsoft solutions..

cheers!

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