I had the same problem with Internet Explorer 6.0.
I switched over to Netscape Browser 8.0.4, which solved the problem for about 2 weeks, before the same connection issues resurfaced. A thorough virus scan turned up nothing.
What did work is Stay Live 2000, Version 3.1 (actually updated May 22, 2005), an internet dial-up connection utility that prevents your Internet Service Provider from dropping your dial-up connection.
Works with MicroSoft Windows 95/98, ME, XP, 2000 or Windows NT.
Go to:
http://www.gregorybraun.com/StayLive.html
and download "STAYLIVE.ZIP" A lean and mean 163K Byte file.
Unzip to a temporary directory and run SETUP.EXE
- After installation, double-click the Stay Live 2000 icon on your desktop, and the icon will also appear in the task bar, since it's now active.
- Double-click the Stay Live 2000 task bar icon to open the program and enter your defaults.
- Select the "General" tab.
- Specify that Stay Live 2000 Refresh at "15 Second" intervals.
- The internet connection status indicator (the two video monitors icon), in your task bar, should now both be lit (when there's activity), indicating full 2-way communication between your computer and the internet.
- I've noticed that opening the Stay Live 2000 settings window, while online, can sometimes conflict with the internet browser. So make the setup and settings changes while offline.
UserAgent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.7.5) Gecko/20051012 Netscape/8.0.4