Hihi!

After a sudden, unexpected and unexplainable event last Thursday, it's been impossible for me to connect to theGameSpy/"The Master Server." and log to EfU.

When I try to log on, I get an error about my nick and no server will load up, (usually, despite not being able to connect to the Master Sever, EfU would still come up in my favorites)but, the GameSpy chat is still working.

When I try to direct-connect it simply times out.

I`ve done what I'm able to do with my limited knowledge, that is to say I tried reconnecting and disabling all of my firewalls.

I am on an University hosted connection, and I suppose it is possible they suddenly blocked the ports one Thursday afternoon, but I have been able to play just fine on the connection for the last few weeks.

Any suggestions of what might help, would be much appriciated! Until then, I guess I'm out of comission.

Many University connections have a "no online gaming" policy, so it may be likely that they have blocked the use of online games from that port. It's all to do with their constant battle against viruses from the internet.

If your university did block it they do have to tell you. So your university should have a techline or tech support guy. I'd call him and just ask if they are blocking online gaming. Either way yes or no at least you'd have a direction to go.

If that fails you could ask someone on mirc or try atari support.

I have asked them, (university tech support) and I'm awating a reply. I just think it's really strange that webchat still works, or isn't this strange at all?

As I said to Pewter earlier, I think I once read about a problem similar to this on the BioWare forums; and, apparently, this could be fixed by changing the port that NWN runs its online game off.

I'm not sure whether this is possible, or where I read it, but, if anybody has any idea about it, I urge you to reply!

"Games in particular use a type of communication that uses UDP based ports, these have cause some issues and had to be temporarily disabled. We are investigating other solutions, although have not found one that will work with our hardware/requirements. So for the moment, any application that is web proxy aware will work fine. Any thing that is not and uses individual UDP ports...such as games, wont work for the moment"

I guess that means I have to bow out of this game until further notice. I'd appologize for all the people Reg bothered, but it was too much fun!

Cheers all!

Please fix soon. Get back in game! :(

We miss you!

Me most though.

I miss you.

This server cannot survive without you. Please return as soon as possible, before it is too late. Here is a cute kitten picture to console you until you are back:

http://www.mycatwearsclothes.com/images/cutekitten6.jpg

EfU is just like that. It has pretty blue eyes only for you.

-SarF

Seemingly, I am in the exceptional position of being the only student on campus unable to connect to the internet client availble for our dorms, and which has the ports opened (after I asked them) Three tech guys has been scratching their bald heads and clicking their pens in frustration over this unusual problem.

So, unfortunatly, I am once again on hold :(

Do you have any firewall software (norton, Windows, McAffee, etc) that could be blocking it? Try turning all of those off.

Also try a dns reset by opening a command prompt and doing the following:

ipconfig /flushdns (press enter after you type this)

followed by the command:

ipconfig /registerdns (then press enter)

you might also want to check out your hosts file, sometimes malware will add entries to it that will redirect your dns or ip requests to their own websites.

the file is located: c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc

double click the file called hosts and choose notepad to open it when prompted for what program to use.

Once in there delete ALL lines below the ones that begin with a # symbol.

save the file and reboot your computer.

If none of this helps, let me know. I do this sort of stuff for a living.

It's all been tried, DJ. I can to the other service, so there is nothing wrong with my settings. The problem, as the tech-guys put it "is on their side" :? as their routerthingythingywhatever isn't giving me internet acess, just local acess.

Sounds like a firewall rule they imposed on the specific port that your computer connects to.

A lot of high end routers and switches have threat detection as part of their built-in protocols. It's likely they just need to reset the port on that switch or router or disable the threat detection.

Usually that sort of detection is used to prevent port scanning from malicious software (and by port I mean data port, not physical port on the switch itself). If the hardware detects lots of hits or ports being scanned (meaning a piece of software is trying to find a way to the internet), it'll block your connection in and/or out.

If you installed something like Kazaa, Shareaza, BitTorrent or some other filesharing software, they'll scan for open data ports (port 80, 8080, 349, etc) for a way to the internet so the software will work correctly. This sort of scan sometimes triggers the hardwares threat detection protocols and shuts it down.

You could take your PC to another dorm room and try it out see if it works. If it does, then its your physical port on whatever hardware it connects to on the university's side.

A simple reset or removal of the rules blocking your port will fix it.

I'm not quite sure what you're getting at, DJ, but let me try and explain my situation again.

The university offers two wireless networks to connect to. One is called "resnet" and is for the students to use in their dorms, for, and I quote "social interaction". This network has the Gamespy port opened, (because I asked them nicely to and they did it.)along with Skype, Kaaza, iTunes, etc.etc.

This network, however, I can only connect to locally, but it will not give me acess to the internet for unknown reasons. (I suspect there is a problem with the DCHPthingy/Standard gateway, but that's just me trying to sound smart after hours of googling) However, it does work for everybody else in my flat, and even in my room.

The other network is for use on-campus-site and is to be used by students, professors, visitors and so forth to acess the internet while on campus and to be used for acessing e-journals, schools website and so forth. It is alot stricter, but I can connect to it just fine.

However, we can acess both networks from our dorms and they have the same proxy settings, requirements and so forth.

have you had someone else plug their computer into the same cable that you use?

Have you considered that their firewall hardware may have blocked just your computers MAC address (a mac address is the digital serial number it uses to identify itself to network hardware)

Firewalls and routers can block certain types of traffic based on a number of things: electronically block your physical port (the jack in the wall), block the specific network port (numeric assignment for certain types of internet traffic i.e.- http, ftp, udp, tcp, etc.), they can block your IP address (DHCP doesn't always give you a new IP address. Often times you get the same over and over again despite it being renewed every 12-24 hours), they can block your MAC address (this is more secure than using an IP address which can change), among others.

They might have opened the port for game spy, but your PC might be blocked for other types of data. Gamespy only facilitates the connection, it acts as a redirector for your gaming.

You can also try this in a DOS prompt:

tracert efu.us.to

(this'll only work if that addy is ping able and allows echo requests)

that will ping every piece of hardware from your computer to efu and back. If it hangs at ANY address (meaning you see an entry then the next entry is a series of ...........) then you've identified the point of the problem. You should contact your tech support with the last successful line it was able to hit....from there they can figure out the problem.