Can NOT Browse in IE or Firefox

[shortylickens]

This problem started with my system last night.
I am running XP Pro with SP2. Got SP2 a month ago with no problems.

Was browsing the Web with IE and all of a sudden I was getting the standard white page
"The page is not available" for EVERY website.
After the standard cable modem reset procedure I called the ISP and went through their troubleshooting procedure for several hours with a live person. We changed every setting we could think of in IE and Windows.
They can't fix it. They were all stumped and mildly irritated. All we could determine is that my modem is visable to their servers and while I can't browse the web with ANYTHING, I am able to PING most major websites through a DOS-box. Yahoo and such ping just fine. Not MSN though. I am able to be pinged too. I CANNOT use email, I have Outlook set up with a web based email server and it gives me a 'Not Connected' error every time I hit F5.
I tried Lavasoft Ad-Aware but I cant get the latest update and it just comes up with cookies at every scan.
EDIT: I use Norton AV 2004, but I can't update the definitions or program because 'Live Update' wont work.

Am currently using a Live DVD of SUSE 9.2 to get online, so I'm sure its a software or OS problem. Are there any Linux utilities that can scan the Windows registry?
Or should I just download some anti-spyware programs to a USB drive and install them in Windows? Has anyone else seen this problem and knows what settings could be messed up?
If anyone needs more info, please ask.

 

[mechBgon]

Were you browsing any sites that you might think of as "risky?" What antivirus software do you use, and be specific about the version, not just "Norton" or something. Can you send & receive email?

 

[shortylickens]

Sorry, forgot some info. I wasnt browsing any risky sites when I lost all contact with the WWW. Just the normal stuff: Hotmail, AT, some reputable gaming sites.

Ok, next problem.
I have decided to go ahead and assume the numerous anti-spyware utilities suggested on this site can help me. Unfortunately, I can only download these utilities to my SUSE desktop. I cant get it to recognize my USB drive or hard drives. It also wont find my CD burner. It seems there is no way to put all these spyware utilities someplace useful. If I email them to myself I wont be able to get them when I am back in Windows.
How do you find a drive in Linux???

 

[xgsound]

If everything in XP is working except internet, try the program "winsockxpfix" from the excellent Malware sticky at the top of the Operating System Forum. This allows xp to reload much of the internal xp internet structure when it has failed for any reason. This worked on 2 xp machines I fixed for friends with cable internet out.

All you need now is the program accessable to xp. It's only 1.37 Mb if you have a floppy.

Jim

 

[shortylickens]

No such luck, I have absolutely no idea how to 'find, align, initialize, or setup' any drives in Linux. No CD burners, no local hard drives, no USB or CF devices, nothing. The 'Suseplugger' config applet acknowledges I have some of these drives, but it wont tell me where to find them when I try to Move or Copy. The YAST2 program shows a bunch of drives, all labeled /dev/XYZ but it wont actually let me do anything with them. I fear I have stumbled into a world not my own.
I did find the winsock program and put it on my desktop though.

 

[shortylickens]

Got it working again!!! I used a different machine to access majorgeeks.com.
Winsockfix did the trick. Thanks everybody who tried to help me.
My apologies for all those who know better and keep up to date with their anti-spyware tools. I am a good example of what not to do.
Special apologies to all the Linux gurus for the N00b questions. I was desperate and needed a quick fix. I will make every effort to break outside the Windows box and learn more before I enter the IT field.