When I install SP2 on Windows XP Home Edition, I cannot use IE or Firefox. It just instantly gives me a blank page on FF or an error page on IE. I cannot disable XP's firewall because both options in the firewall menu are grayed out. My cable modem lights work perfectly, and a technician working for my ISP that I called told me that my modem pinged perfectly.

What's going on? Thanks!

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Hi

Go to start > run > type in cmd. In the black window that appears type in Netsh firewall show state >> c:\output.txt - wait a bit

Go to c: and you will see a notepad window called output.txt > open in and post the contents of the file in the next reply

Hmmm... It's weird, I reinstalled SP2 and now it seems to be working perfectly fine. IE and FF both work. However the firewall options are still greyed out.

Here's output.txt:

Have you issued the command before or after the reinstall?

Go to start > run > cmd > type in : netsh firewall reset
Reboot - does it work now?

It shows that the SP2 firewall is disabled - are you running any other firewall?
Are you running a legit copy of XP?

Go to start > run > type in regedit. In the window that opens scroll to see if you can find the following path : HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Polici­ es\Microsoft\WindowsFirewall

Well, I got it fixed... It seems that I only needed to delete a registry key to make the firewall usable again, well at least to turn it off.

The post: http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r18908434-

Still, thanks a bunch guys!

That's what I was going for - glad you got it fixed