No Zone Alarm running... and this is why I am puzzled. PP says "couldn't resolve host name" to everything with exception to that ip for yahoo, which eventually said that it couldn't find them and 100% packet loss. Now in msdos I get "request timed out". 4 packets sent and o received and 4 lost?? Is there some setting someone somewhere could have flicked on or off to prevent me from pinging? Is there some other place I should look or check or inquire with? Thanks for your time.