PC has network connection but browsers don't
 

Now my wife's other XP PC is down. It caught a trojan (some internet security program) which Malwarebytes dispatched then a week later a second trojan (persistent porn site) which Malwarebytes also dispatched. After the second trojan was dispatched, a friend of hers enabled Windows updates for the first time in the PC's ~15 months of use. After updating SP2 to SP3 and IE6 to IE8 among other things, IE and Chrome will not connect to the internet even if other apps are able to connect for updates and such. IE's diagnostics say the firewall is blocking connectivity, though it makes the same claim even when the Windows firewall is disabled. Other PCs on the same network behave normally so I'm sure the problem is isolated to this PC.

I removed AVG and Malwarebytes, installed a MS SP3 patch for this symptom when SP3 was installed without disabling AV (AVG wasn't manually disabled for the SP3 update) and performed netsh winsock and IP resets. No joy after a hundred reboots.

I've tried the fixes suggested online so I'm stuck for what to do next. This is an obscure netbook for which I can't find drivers so reinstalling XP is a last resort. What can I try next?

Thanks,
Sixto
87 300D

Wipe it and put Windows 7 on it.

make sure it isn't set to use a proxy server. go into internet options in IE or through the control panel. Connections tab, then Lan settings button.

I've seen lots of malware enable the proxy server to goof up the net connection

I looked at proxy settings and such but I don't know enough to identify anomalies or make changes. I reset IE settings to default and that allowed IE and Chrome to connect.

This little netbook has an Atom processor and 1GB RAM so Windows 7 is a stretch :)

Thanks for your help!

Sixto
87 300D

You shouldn't have any proxy settings at all. It should be enabled to directly connect to the internet.

Definitely looks like you got it working.

What trojan infected your computer? If it was Vundo then you need to update your Java SE runtime environment.

Do it here http://java.sun.com/javase/downloads/index.jsp

Vundo hit my wife's main PC. It didn't affect browser connectivity. The trojan/s that blocked the browsers were anitvirus and internet security offers.

Sixto
87 300D

Go to Network properties and delete the TCPIP protocol from your card. Reboot your PC. It will re-install a new set of TCPIP DLL's. Hijacking software often corrupt these. If that doesn't work, you've got some hidden file in there somewhere loading up that the malware scrubber did not delete. Best solution is to re-install windows as an Upgrade or go to newer operating system.

*2

If there is even a hint of a virus on a computer I'm working on I just wipe and reinstall. At the corporate IT level this is really easy and most users save their data on the network disk. Just reimage and kazaam you're done.

On my own computer if I were to get a virus (hasn't happened since 2005), then I would do a wipe and reinstall. Every year I format and rebuild my windows installs. It's a yearly maintenance item for me since the speed benefits of starting fresh are incredible.

I'm hoping windows 7 changes that.

Incorrect. My sister has an Acer Netbook with a 16 gig SSD drive, 1.5 gigs of ram, and an Atom CPU just like that, and it runs Windows 7 very well. You'd be surprised. Win7 is extremely good at memory and resource management.