Windows 7 WIN7 SP1 POST INSTALLATION PROBLEM

[dniaak]

I have installed [4/5/2011] Win7 SP1 (via windows update) on an Acer

Aspire 1410-8414 notebook, with Win7 home premium installed.

Now no browser [IE, FF or Chrome] will load any website. The computer

connects to the internet, and media players will open streaming net

radio and tv stations without a problem, and program updating works

too; so it is just a browser issue.

The strange thing is that the embeded web browser within Winamp does

function properly, so only stand-alone browsers won't load.

What I have done:
1] In Control Pannel>AdminTools>Services: computer browser and all
relevant IP services are started and running properly.

2] In PC Tools firewall: unrestricted in/out privilages are allowed for
all 3 browsers, and network status is "active".

3] There is no apparent conflict with Avast6 web or network shields.
4] I have reset/refreshed: winsock,ipv4,ipv6 and flushed dns.

I can't think of anything else to do. I don't want to have to

uninstall SP1 to be able to get online. Any ideas? Thanks.

 

[Trouble]

dniaak;
Hello and welcome to the forums. Please refrain from cross posting in multiple forums, this can often result in unnecessary confusion when other members are unaware of the cross posts. I have moved, merged and then deleted the duplicate post to hopefully prevent any such problems.
So, now let's concentrate on Internet Explorer and see if we can determine the issue.
Are you receiving any specific errors in IE or just a plain old Page Not Found or Unable to Display?
With IE open, select "Tools" from the menu bar. (If the menu bar is not present just hit the "Alt" key to bring it up). Then select "Internet Options", then the "Connections" tab at the top, then the "LAN settings" button near the bottom and uncheck everything in there (assuming of course that you are not using a known proxy server) and OK your way back out of there, close and reopen the browser and see if that makes any difference. The presense of an entry in the proxy server address box may indicate the presense of some malware especially if the entry was something like 0.0.0.0 or 127.0.0.1 so you might want to check for malware if something was there.
Additionally try copying and pasteing this into the address/url bar of IE and hit enter and see if google comes up.
64.233.169.99
If the google webpage loads that would indicate a problem with DNS resolution so you may want to make sure that the results of an
ipconfig /all
are what you expect them to be, and are reflecting either you inside edge of your router or a known good DNS server address. Or you might consider manually setting them to a public resource like Google's public DNS servers which are
8.8.8.8
and
8.8.4.4
You may also want to take a look here
C:\Windows\System32\drivers\etc
at a file called
hosts
you can open it with notepad (to edit you will need to remove the "Read Only" attribute.
look for any entries (lines) that are not preceeded by a hash/pound (#) symbol
I would suggest removing any such entries unless you know how and why they are present.
Keep us posted.
Good luck
Randy

 

[dniaak]

RE IE: I am receiving error message "IE cannot display the web page". The blank browser

then hangs at the homepage loading stage. When I run Windows network diagnostic the

result is: "Troubleshooting couldn't identify the problem." Keep in mind, however, that

Winamp's embeded browser WILL open any website.

I did as you suggested in Lan Settings ---- nothing checked. The proxy server address

box was blank. I restarted. The result: no more error message, just a blank homepage

that hangs at loading.

Google page does not load either.

Current Windows IP Configuration:

Connection-specific DNS Suffix . : myhome.westell.com
DNS Servers . . . . . . . . . . . : 192.168.1.1
192.168.1.1

[I can send you the whole IP Config report if you need it. Wasn't sure if there are any

entries that shouldn't be publicly viewed.]


The only entries in the "hosts" file not preceeded by "#" are:

127.0.0.1 localhost
::1 localhost

There are no "source server" or "client host" adresses.

Thanks for the help.

 

[Trouble]

Not sure where to go from here.
You can try using IE->tools->internet options->Advanced Tab-> and then use both the "Restore advanced settings" and the "Reset..." button to return IE to it's factory default settings. That's up to you.
I suspect that you have some type of firewall issue and you may have to resort to uninstalling both Avast as well as PC Tools as attempting to turn them off or disable them in some fashion will probably not do much good. You may also want to briefly turn off the built-in Windows Firewall for testing.
You can always reinstall the two third party products after you test and determine whether or not they may be causing your problem. And of course turn back on the Windows Firewall.
Additionally please make sure that you can (from a command prompt) ping 64.233.169.99
Keep us posted.
Regards
Randy

 

[Saltgrass]

Did IE 9 install, or attempt to install?

 

[dniaak]

I found out that the problem is a conflict between Avast 6 (network or behavior shields) and SP1.
I uninstalled Avast, then edited out all Avast entries from the Windows registry and restarted. Browsers worked fine. I did a clean install of Avast 6, just to see what would happen. All browsers now functioned normally ---- that is, until I restarted the system. Now, once again, no browser will load. The techs at Avast so far have been no help. It looks like I will have to either dump Avast, or use version 5.0xx which does work with Win 7 SP1.

 

[dniaak]

Yes, IE9 did install. However, having already had bad experience with it on my Dell desktop, I uninstalled it and reverted to v8.0.7600.
[Also, see new reply to Randy.]

 

[Trouble]

Glad to here that you were able to resolve your problem (sort of), and thanks for posting back and updating your thread with your findings.
Thanks again for joining our community and we hope to continue to see you around.
Best Wishes
Randy