Problems with MSDN site

[wey97]

Has anyone had problems loading the MSDN site in IE? If I type the url msdn.microsoft.com I'm forwarded to http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/default.aspx and my IE browser returns an XML document.

Firefox loads the home page fine, but the behavior of MS sites is unpredictable.

Any ideas?

[RhinoBull]

I have no problem what so ever [using IE].

[wey97]

I also get this error pretty regularly:

The XML page cannot be displayed 
Cannot view XML input using style sheet. Please correct the error and then click the Refresh button, or try again later. 


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Access is denied. Error processing resource 'http://msdn.microsoft.com/'

Refreshing shows the XML file.

[RobDog888]

What version of IE are you running? Have you done a Windows Update lately?

[wey97]

What version of IE are you running? Have you done a Windows Update lately?

I'm religious with Windows Updates. Just checked this morning.

[RobDog888]

I'm running the same version but different product id as mine is non-retail.
Cant think of anything right now of why it would be different for you.

[RhinoBull]

Could security and/or options settings be part of this?

[wey97]

Could security and/or options settings be part of this?

I changed my security settings back to the defaults and it still happens. Sometimes with a lot of refreshes I can get it to load.

[RobDog888]

Hmm, may be either a network connection issue or try corrupted internet cache. Try deleting your cookies and all offline files too.

[RhinoBull]

... Try deleting your cookies and all offline files too.

That's exactly what I would do at last...

[RobDog888]

Yes, I dont like to delete my cookies too often as it can be a pain to have to log back in to websites and check the remoember me checkbox all over again.

[wey97]

Hmm, may be either a network connection issue or try corrupted internet cache. Try deleting your cookies and all offline files too.

I'm always deleting my cookies and internet cache with offline files (which I shouldn't have anyway) and I run CCleaner all the time. Still no luck.

I have noticed, after I finally get to the MSDN site, the content, only on that site, loads painfully slow and locks up IE for at least 20-30 seconds just for the page to finish loading.

I tried doing a master reset on my web settings and that didn't help either.
It has to be an IE thing, Firefox seems to load everything fine.

I noticed I have a slew of Add-Ons in IE:

Active Desktop Mover				(Microsoft)
Adobe PDF Reader Link Helper			(Adobe)
DHTML Edit Control Safe for Scripting IE5	(Microsoft)
DriveLetterAccess				(Sonic)
HHCtrl Object					(Microsoft)
Java Plug-in					(Sun)
Java Plug-in					(Sun)
Java Plug-in 1.5.0_06				(Sun)
MUWebControl Class				(Microsoft)
Office Update Installation Engine		(Microsoft)
Research
Search AssistantOC				(Microsoft)
Shell Name Space				(Microsoft)
Shockwave Flash Object				(Adobe)
SSVHelper Class					(Sun)
Sun Java Console				(Sun)
WebNetTools.Tools
Windows Genuine Advantage Validation Tool	(Microsoft)
Windows Media Player				(Microsoft)
Windows Messenger
XML Document					(Microsoft)
Yahoo! Toolbar					(Yahoo)
Yahoo! Toolbar Helper				(Yahoo)
YInstStarter Class				(Yahoo)

I tried disabling all of these and still no luck. IE leaves you know way to uninstall any of these.

[RhinoBull]

...It has to be an IE thing, Firefox seems to load everything fine...

I don't think it's the "IE thing" - I use IE, only IE and nothing but IE without any problems so I tend to believe (after your last post) that it's one of those add-ons that slows you down so get rid of them - useless anyway (for me at least ).

[wey97]

I don't think it's the "IE thing" - I use IE, only IE and nothing but IE without any problems so I tend to believe (after your last post) that it's one of those add-ons that slows you down so get rid of them - useless anyway (for me at least ).

Well what I meant was an "IE thing" with my IE thing

I don't know a good way to get rid of the add-ons without manually unregistering the dlls and ocxs then deleting them. Wouldn't be a good idea to delete shell32.dll by accident which is where the "Active Desktop Mover" add-on is loaded from. Who knows what other apps I could break by getting rid of the dlls or ocxs.

[RhinoBull]

You don't manually unregister them - you uninstall software that dumped any of those components on your system. It could be done through "Add/Remove programs" from the Control Panel.

[wey97]

You don't manually unregister them - you uninstall software that dumped any of those components on your system. It could be done through "Add/Remove programs" from the Control Panel.

I know - I already uninstalled the Yahoo Toolbar suite which gets rid of those add-ons but there are some listed that I can't tell what software they're installed by. A Browser Extension named Research? with no file or publisher listed. Seems like it could be adware or spyware.

As well as the many from Microsoft which can't be uninstalled.

It doesn't really matter if I can't uninstall anyway. I disabled all of the Add-ons and I still have the same problem.

[wey97]

Seems even Firefox is having problems with the MSDN site loading.
Is anyone else having problems?

[EDIT]
Forgot to mention this error occurs on a site search.

[Valleysboy1978]

That's really odd, I'm having no problem on Firefox or IE. You tried re-installing IE/Fx?

[wey97]

That's really odd, I'm having no problem on Firefox or IE. You tried re-installing IE/Fx?

I don't know where to get a full install version of IE to do a re-install. I've tried reinstalling Firefox with no luck.

After about 2-3 minutes of waiting, (the message is "Waiting for msdn2.microsoft.com...") I finally get the MSDN Home Page. Then if I try searching in the very top, right corner, I get the XML error I posted above, after about 2 minutes of waiting of course.

Very strange.

[Valleysboy1978]

Okay, so I can try and replicate the problem (as I'm getting nowhere at the moment), what are you searching for?

also, IE can be had at Microsoft. Although this is IE 7

[RobDog888]

Hmm, the only way I see to reinstall IE sp2 is to reinstall xp sp2. Search ms to see if there is any issues if you do try to reinstall sp2.