IE & Firefox not connecting but MSN can

blissfulbabe

Hi Guys

My daughter has gone back to uni and is having problems connecting to the internet. Her room has a cable connection, which was working fine on Thursday, and she was able to connect to the internet via my wireless network this morning but when she tried to connect to the internet this evening, in her room, neither FireFox or IE will connect, although MSN is working fine.

Neither of us is computer literate but we have tried the following so far:

Full virus scan (she uses Kasperski)
Clearing the IE history/ temporary files etc
Using the IE reset function
Running IE without add ons
(Briefly) turning off Windows Defender
Checking her settings to make sure that nothing is ticked (eg LAN settings)

I would dearly love to get this sorted as she has had a bit of a rough start to her uni experience as she has had a bad case of flu and missed out on Freshers Week and getting to know her flatmates and is threatening to come home for good as she feels very low and isolated. If we can the internet working it might help to tip the balance in keeping her at uni - any advice would be appreciated.

The only problem is that everything has to be done over the phone as I don't have the computer here, so I might be a little slow in replying to any suggestions.

Thanks in advance for any help.

ukbill69

Try google chrome.

Money_Grabber13579

Try Malwarebytes. If there is anything to be found, it should find it. Update and run a full scan.

HTML200

This sounds like a network configuration issue to me, not a virus/malware problem.

Is her university connection wired, or wireless?

Is it provided by the university?

If so, she should get hold of the university's instructions for connecting a PC and follow those.

Money_Grabber13579

HTML200 wrote: »

This sounds like a network configuration issue to me, not a virus/malware problem.

Is her university connection wired, or wireless?

Is it provided by the university?

If so, she should get hold of the university's instructions for connecting a PC and follow those.

But it was working okay a few days ago. It's just suddenly stopped, so it's unlikely to be the network connection. Also it does connect to the network as MSN still works.

That's why I thought virus, as it could be blocking access to the browsers.

HTML200

Given that it was working okay in the morning via one network, but not working in the evening via another network, that says network problems to me. Could be a virus, can't rule it out, but I don't think it's the most likely explanation, especially given that you've done a full scan with Kasperski.

The fact that MSN works but not the browser doesn't mean it's not a network config issue. Browsers and Instant messengers use different protocols and ports, so a problem can be confined to one of them.

Have you installed anything new on the PC recently?

Is her university connection wired, or wireless?

Is it provided by the university?

Money_Grabber13579

Yep, but what I was trying to say was that it was working the previous day on the network that now isn't working, if that makes any sense!

HTML200

Yes, that makes sense, but there are a lot of reasons why those conditions could occur. I'm trying to narrow down the possibilities by asking you questions. It's difficult to help if you don't answer the questions

Money_Grabber13579

HTML200 wrote: »

Yes, that makes sense, but there are a lot of reasons why those conditions could occur. I'm trying to narrow down the possibilities by asking you questions. It's difficult to help if you don't answer the questions

Oh, but it's not me who has the problem!;):D

The OP's gone off line now, so we'll not get any answers til tomorrow at least!

I was just making sure you knew that the network did work at a time, but has now stopped!;)

blissfulbabe

Hi Guys

her connection is at university is wired and was working fine last time she used it. I was thinking that she might have a virus or malware as she does download from the net - she's insisitng it can't be that as she is running AV but I know form experience that even with the best AV things slip through.

I'll download the program recommended and send it to her on a disk.

zenmaster

Is the connection through a router?

I get this quite a lot with my Belkin.

I power the router off and on and it works again.