37 replies to this topic

[misseswojo]

I have been unable to get into the forum, chat, or gallery since yesterday morning. I am able to get onto the other pages fine (home, boutique, learn how, blog). At first I figured it was a site problem because I tried to log in on 3 different computers in the house and I receive a cannot connect to website error or website doesn't exist message. I even tried on my iPhone which was running off our same Internet connection (comcast) and it didn't work. I did an Internet search of scrapgirls forums and tried several links with the same results. Angle even sent me the direct link to the forums but that doesn't work either for me. I called my Internet service and they said it was not a problem on their end. They asked if it was a secured site and I said no and explained that other members are not having a problem, only me and only those sites I mentioned above. I can get onto any other sites on the Internet with no problems. My husband knows a lot about computers and he has tried everything but we just can not figure out the problem. We even tried to log on through an insecure, no firewall connection and it still would not work. He finally came up with the idea to take my phone off our wireless Internet connection and just use the 3G AT&T phone connection and that worked. That is how I am able to send this message, through my phone which I must say...is not fun. So if anyone has any suggestions, please let me know because we have ran out of ideas.
Thanks,
Patty

[PolkaDot]

I doubt this is an issue, but can you try clearing your internet browsing history, cookies and temp files under Tools>Internet Options, rebooting and trying again. That's usually the first thing I try. I had similar problems recently during the extreme heat wave, although I don't get how that would affect your access to certain areas. Thinking, and hoping someone will come along with better ideas.

[PolkaDot]

Copied this info from HELP, but I don't think I would attempt this. Just thought you might be able to ask Comcast about this. HOPING that they will be helpful (DD uses Comcast...) Service Electric is down you way, too, aren't they?

Why can't I view some websites?

If you can access some websites but not all of them, here are some possible causes:

Your browser could be attempting to connect through a proxy server. If so, try connecting with the proxy server turned off.

Your browser connection settings could be incorrect. To change connection settings, follow these steps:

Click to open Internet Options.

Click the Connections tab.

Your router could be attempting to proxy DNS requests and failing. Refer to the documentation that came with your router for instructions on disabling DNS proxying.

Parental Controls, Family Safety, or some other parental control software could be blocking access to certain websites.

[PolkaDot]

I have been unable to get into the forum, chat, or gallery since yesterday morning. I am able to get onto the other pages fine (home, boutique, learn how, blog). At first I figured it was a site problem because I tried to log in on 3 different computers in the house and I receive a cannot connect to website error or website doesn't exist message. I even tried on my iPhone which was running off our same Internet connection (comcast) and it didn't work. I did an Internet search of scrapgirls forums and tried several links with the same results. Angle even sent me the direct link to the forums but that doesn't work either for me. I called my Internet service and they said it was not a problem on their end. They asked if it was a secured site and I said no and explained that other members are not having a problem, only me and only those sites I mentioned above. I can get onto any other sites on the Internet with no problems. My husband knows a lot about computers and he has tried everything but we just can not figure out the problem. We even tried to log on through an insecure, no firewall connection and it still would not work. He finally came up with the idea to take my phone off our wireless Internet connection and just use the 3G AT&T phone connection and that worked. That is how I am able to send this message, through my phone which I must say...is not fun. So if anyone has any suggestions, please let me know because we have ran out of ideas.
Thanks,
Patty

Re-reading your message, and I would call Comcast again on Monday and tell them that you were able to access using the phone card. That sure sounds like a good clue. Good Luck!

[DixieLee]

I am only saying that when our household used one internet for computers and phones we had problems having enough energy to run it all--comcast went through our home and said the phone in my bedroom was not getting enough juice and when there was a problem I had to look at the box and lights on my husband's desk and determine if I needed to disconnect the phone--and comcast said it was not on their end it was in my home. We didn't have this problem before only when we had the internet company do our phones as well. (just an idea) Sure hope you get it fixed!!!!!

[tinkerbell11]

Did you figure it out Patty? I hope so how annoying! Let us know.

[Sara Arell]

Patty, I know that when this happens to me, it's always my internet service causing the problem OR something wonkly with my browser - usually, I restart my computer and if that doesn't fix it then I call my internet provider - I've been having similar problems the last few days and found out that they had been working on the cable lines nearby and had clipped something that was causing my problems - I had no problem logging on with my phone or my IPad but could not on my home computer either -

I hope you get it straightened out soon - I know how frustrating this can be......

[misseswojo]

Ladies I am still having the same problems. My hubby is doing his thing...trying to figure this out. We do not have a home phone...we just use our cells phones now. Thanks to everyone who has responded, I really appreciate it. We have a wireless network setup at our home. My husband is checking the router right now. If that doesn't work, I guess I will call comcast again. However they were no help at all yesterday. They would not even go to the scrapgirls website just to make sure it worked okay for them. I will keep you updated...I am hating this typing from my phone.
Thanks,
Patty

[Sara Arell]

Hi Patty! Have you figured this out yet?

[misseswojo]

No, still not working. I still can't get on through any of our computers, only my phone if I use the AT&T 3G connection. My phone won't work either if I try to use the WiFi. My husband said that he tried 2 separate routers and neither will work but if he goes straight into the modem, it works. So he doesn't think it's a comcast issue. He said something is going on where the website forum or gallery is trying to do something when I try to go to that page and I guess the router is blocking it. But he took the routers down to no protection and no firewall, still won't work. I hate to buy another router because there is a good chance it still won't work because there really isn't anything wrong with ours. Again I can go any where on the Internet or this website except the forum or gallery. Does anyone know of there were any changes or updates or anything like that. This started happening Saturday. Any ideas...any help would be appreciated.
Thanks,
Patty

[Sara Arell]

No, still not working. I still can't get on through any of our computers, only my phone if I use the AT&T 3G connection. My phone won't work either if I try to use the WiFi. My husband said that he tried 2 separate routers and neither will work but if he goes straight into the modem, it works. So he doesn't think it's a comcast issue. He said something is going on where the website forum or gallery is trying to do something when I try to go to that page and I guess the router is blocking it. But he took the routers down to no protection and no firewall, still won't work. I hate to buy another router because there is a good chance it still won't work because there really isn't anything wrong with ours. Again I can go any where on the Internet or this website except the forum or gallery. Does anyone know of there were any changes or updates or anything like that. This started happening Saturday. Any ideas...any help would be appreciated.
Thanks,
Patty

I don't think Angie or April have seen your post yet but I'm not sure. Can you email Angie and see what she might suggest? She and April are computer whiz's and might know what to tell you.

[SodScrap]

Oh how frustrating....I'm sorry you are dealing with this.

[Sara Arell]

Patty, I emailed Angie for you.

[PolkaDot]

Well, you might get better help from Comcast on a weekday, OR you can ask to speak with a supervisor. Good Luck.

[BarbaraC1977]

Patty, I'm coming to this late, but is Scrap Girls the only message board/activity you can't do?

For security reasons, my browsers (all of them) require me to re-login periodically, like every 15 or 30 days. My Scrap Girls account has a a Message Board username that's DIFFERENT from my login name. My login name is not BarbaraC1977; it's a particular email address.

Sometimes I forgot and try the wrong login name. Or I get a little sloppy with my "hard" passwords. The forums are also set to NOT tolerate more than two or three wrong tries to login. If you hit the limit, you have to wait a while before re-trying (as in minutes or an hour or so.) Again, it's a security thing.

So, check with Angie to see if you're using the correct login name (often not your username.) And I think she can send you a link to reset your password, also. Hope this helps.

[misseswojo]

My husband has been working on this for about 6 hours now and still nothing. Angie did send me the direct forum link and it doesn\'t work for me. It isn\'t a password or login name issue because I can\'t even open the forum or gallery. I can open all the other pages though. The forum and gallery have a different link than the other pages, that much we do know (it goes from a .com to a .net). I was able to get on Saturday morning and than when I tried later in the day, I got the can\'t open the internet page or error trying to open page, etc... I have no problems with anything else on the internet, just those 2 mentioned above. I am currently using a free proxy server off the internet to connect right now but this can only be used temporarally. My computer is not protected at all right now using this. My husband said we will go buy a new router tomorrow but I don\'t think that is going to fix the problem because we tried 2 different routers that we have and neither worked. Plus the fact that I can get onto any other website with no problems and also the other pages on here. It just seems that I can\'t get onto the .net forum or .net gallery.

Patty

[Ro]

Because you can access the site via hard-wire to your computer and without wifi, it is an indication that the router is blocking it. For some reasons, you router decided to keep you away from this one particular website. (Some router's have that capability - parental controls).

Here are some articles and discussions I found about how to fix this sort of situation.

http://forums.cnet.c...102-533358.html

http://www.associate..._your_home.html

Probably the best thing is to find the routers instructions (they could be found online) and find out how websites are blocked via the router. You could then figure out how to unblock it.

Here's an interesting one about someone who logged in via public wifi and then she was blocked everyone else (other networks). There is a solution given. Maybe it would help.

http://forums.macrum.../t-1117545.html

[scrappinchar]

Patty, I don't know enough about computers, routers, etc to even begin to help...I just wanted to say that I hope you get it fixed soon. I can only imagine how frustrating this is for you.

[CRS]

I hope you get it figured out soon! I know enough to get into trouble, but not enough to help you out! Crossing my fingers you get it figured out. You must have a pretty great dh to spend all this time for you!!

[Sara Arell]

I hope you find a solution soon, Patty - this has to be very frustrating! I'm like Carla, I know enough to get myself in computer-land trouble but not enough to know how to fix something like this!

[misseswojo]

My husband changed the DNS table in the router and it seemed to be working. Also tech support flushed the scrapgirl\'s server\'s firewall. Thank you so much Angie and Ro.
However, I now can\'t get onto the forum again. It worked for a short time earlier. I was able to pull up the forum page but when I tried to log on, that was it. Now I can\'t even pull up the page. My husband said that he honestly doesn\'t think buying a new router is going to help because I can access the entire internet and all the scrapbook pages except the forum, gallery, or chat. We really are at a loss here...really nothing else we can do on my end.

Patty

[PolkaDot]

Maybe you could run through all the options under Tools in Internet Explorer and make sure you didn't add some filter inadvertantly with keystrokes? Or, do a system restore to an earlier date? Maybe an automatic update made some kind of change.

[Ro]

It really sounds like your router has decided to block the website, particularly since it works fine if he plugs your computer right into the modem. Routers can be set to block certain websites. I've done a bunch of looking about today about it sounds like it happens to people at time. From what I am reading, the best solution may be to contact the support team of the company that made your router for ideas.

I know it can't be the Comcast has decided it's a bad site because I use Comcast!

I'm sure your husband has already done it, but it's worth a shot to ask. One time, I got blocked from my FTP site (I was doing a bunch of downloading). I unplugged my modem and my router. Turned them off. Then I plugged in my modem and then my router and it solved it.

I read that one guy uninstalled and reinstalled his network card when something like it happened to him.

Here are some other possible solutions that seem to be different than you have tried. They all involved the same thing - suddenly the person can't get to one website.

http://forum1.netgea...ead.php?t=56449

http://fixunix.com/f...-wgr-200-a.html

http://forum.noteboo...ng-website.html

http://homecommunity...ite/td-p/383899

Hope one of them works!

[misseswojo]

You will not believe this. Chris and I were busy all day yesterday and we needed to take a break from this issue. So yesterday evening I decided to start looking at some of the links that Ro sent to me (Thank you very much Ro & everyone for your help). We didn't buy a new router because our router works fine for everything else. I go and try to get on the Internet and it didn't work at all. We checked our modem and it stopped working. We couldn't believe this could be happening. The router and now the modem...we are going to have to buy both now. Chris decided to give Comcast a call. It is a good thing he did because they were aware of a problem in our area and were working on restoring our service. So it doesn't look like our modem died after all. I am using my cell phone's data service right now and I gotta tell you, I am not a fan. It's just to hard to use this little phone to do anything major. I just wanted to update everyone and I hope we get service back soon so we can start working on the router issue again. Chris did call Belkin the other day and they were no help...they told him it was a site issue. I might be calling them back again today.

Patty

[teecee]

Sure hope you get it resolved real soon Patty!

[Sara Arell]

Oh, Patty - you must be just pulling your hair out! This is all just so frustrating! I hope you find a resolution very soon - we miss you on here!

[scrappinchar]

Goodness! You are having a rough time with all of this! I hope it's all fixed soon.

[CRS]

I'm so frustrated for you. I wish I could help, but I'll keep praying it's resolved soon.

[April Showers]

I hope they get those problems sorted out for you! We had local problems like that a lot when we had Comcast. It was really frustrating. Tech guys were always really nice and came on time and everything. We haven't needed a tech guy at all since we switched to a different provider.

[misseswojo]

I am Happy to say that I am back...thanks to Angie, Ro, and everyone else who helped to fix or correct (not even sure how the problem was solved) my issues with not having access to the forum, gallery, or chat. So now I am just trying to get caught up on reading and replying to posts, etc...I was going through withdrawl for over 2 weeks:) But everything seems to be working just fine now. Thanks again to everyone for your posts.

Patty