petronius arbiter

I just did my annual OS re-install. Now I find that I can't get into
one of my three Yahoo mailboxes; I get a "page cannot be opened"
error. The other two addresses work perfectly. I have installed Norton
2008, and get a clear virus scan; ditto with Housecall, Adaware etc.
Only this one mailbox is affected, and I can open it as normal from
any other computer, including the laptop on the same network as this
machine.

Does anyone have a clue what could be going on here?

glowingbluemist

Are you using a mail program to access the affected account or typing the
username and password manually? If using a mail program try deleting the
username and password and enter them into it again. It's possible a hidden
or control key was hit by accident when you set it up.

If you are using just a web browser to access the account then make sure you
are entering the username and password manually and not using "stored"
values that some browsers keep for you. Again it's possible the browser has
"memorized" a wrong entry and is just sending it each time you try to
connect. Another thought is to try a different browser like Firefox on
that machine and see if that is able to connect properly. If it does then
IE is the problem. Some filter is set to block the account or the account
info incorrectly being stored in IE.

If two different browser programs can not log into the account using manual
entry then it's time to see if a firewall, Windows internal or something
else you may have installed, anti-virus, or anti-spyware programs is causing
the problem by turning them off before a test connect.

petronius arbiter

Hi -

Many thanks for this.

I enter the name and password manually through the web browser. It
makes no difference which browser I use, and both the other accounts
are perfectly normal. Turning off the firewall makes no difference.

One real problem here is Norton 2008 - how *do* you disable it??
Unlike previous versions, there's no "disable" option anywhere that I
can see on the interface.

glowingbluemist

I stopped using Norton products a couple of years ago after finding that
Freeware based programs were available that do as good a job. True it takes
some research but I personally could not see paying Norton each year for
what soon became an annual upgrade, so someone else will have to help you
with that.

Another thing you might try is to boot one of the Linux Live CD's and try
the browser that comes with it.

Here is one source for downloading a free copy that you can burn to a CD.
http://www.knoppix.net/

True its a 700MB download but it's still a nice package to have around when
Windows has problems accessing a hard drive or other device as well as
troubleshooting problems like yours.

This would eliminate your entire Windows OS as well as Norton from the
equation. If you are still not able to open the email account using the
Linux operating system from CD then it's time to start going up the chain of
devices from your PC. As in do you have a router, wireless or otherwise,
that your PC is connecting through. Some of them have built in firewalls
which could cause problems if someone has messed around with it on you. Who
knows, a static hit might have "adjusted" some value.

As you surmise, if you can open the email account with the operating system
booted live from the CD then yes, something is wrong with the software on
the PC. If it were me I'd make sure the Windows XP firewall is actually
turned off using the control panel. Then if the problem persists, I would
try to uninstall the Norton package if no one is able to tell you how to
bypass or disable it temporarily.

Short of the above you might have to consider doing the re-install all over
again but try connecting to the email account with nothing more than the
stuff that XP installs, like IE. No Norton or other software packages added
to the mix. Then add them one at-a-time and see which software package is
actually causing the problem.