IE re-routes msn.com to acer.us.msn.com

[Andrzejek]

I’ve got this Acer Netbook a couple of months ago, and from the very start every time in Internet Explorer (latest version) when I want to go to

http://www.msn.com,

it ‘re-routes’ me to ‘acer.us.msn.com’ – and that’s NOT where I want to go. I called Acer customer support several times and over several hours we went from resetting IE to original settings (not that I changed anything in IE anyway) to restoring Acer to its factory configuration (which took more than an hour). Acer even suggested using something else that IE, but why? If I have IE why can’t I use it, right? I did my research in the Internet, found some other people with the same problem (sometimes with other computers/makers re-routing IE’s msn.com to xxx.us.msn.com where xxx is something else that Acer), but no solutions that would work.

Acer customer support gave up on the fix and they will send me set of installation CDs so I can re-install OS on my Netbook (I guess). Acer also claims they do not have such a Web site as ‘acer.us.msn.com’

I checked the registry as much as I could and I did find one entry of ‘acer.msn.com’ and I changed it to just ‘

http://www.msn.com’,

but that did not made any difference how IE prevents me from accessing

http://www.msn.com

Any suggestions of where to look for this ‘acer.us.msn.com’ on my netbook and how to get rid of it??


Have fun.

---- Andy

 

[goombawaho]

Congratulations, you have spent hours on a problem that could have been bypassed by switching to another browser. The mind boggles.

But...................

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/7840-63-homepage-asus

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/...1a?msgId=4a49a887-37f4-4e0f-80e9-5357bba57a82

 

[Andrzejek]

Thank you for the links, I will give them a try.

And it is not that I am stuck on IE and don’t want to go to another browser. I used to use Netscape for years and was very happy with it. It is that I can see the problem and I want to solve it.


Have fun.

---- Andy

 

[goombawaho]

Okay good. Solving a problem because you want to is better and different from not giving up because you're obsessive.

One is a good trait - the other requires counseling. You have more patience than I do.

 

[Andrzejek]

goombawaho,

While I was searching for a fix I did find the first site you suggested. I have tried all the steps they mentioned - no luck.

The answers.microsoft.com was new to me, so I also tried all their suggestions, including 'temporary' fix of including the offending acer.us.msn.com as Restricted site in IE. No cigar... :-(

So I guess I will wait for Acer's CDs and see what will happen....

Have fun.

---- Andy

 

[cmeagan656]

Any chance that you're using Zone Alarm and that it was installed before you used IE for the first time?

Hope this helps.

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[tlcscousin]

Quite often an anti-virus/security software program will stop home page changes.
Check Internet Options-->Connections-->LAN Settings and ensure no check marks in any boxes.
look at your Anti-Virus program and ensure it doesnt have a setting to block Home Page Changes.
Uninstall The MSN toolbar (if installed) reboot and then change the home page

 

[MarcLodge]

Have you searched the registry for all occurences of ACER and removed any that might refer to this problem?

If the problem still exists after doing this, check the registry again to see if they've been added back. If they have, have a look at the startup programs under MSCONFIG to see if anything unusual is lurking there and have a look in the registry under key HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run tp see if there is anything there too.

If all of that turns up nothing, try disabling all add ons in IE8 and if that resolves it, turn each one back on one by one to see if you can discover which one is causing the problem.

Marc

 

[Andrzejek]

I will try those suggestions.
But just to let you know - I have this problem with aces.us.msn.com ever since I've got his netbook: when I came from the store and opened the box, pull the netbook out, set it up and run IE with nothing else inslatted - had this problem already. Right out from the box. Pretty sad :-(

Have fun.

---- Andy

 

[MarcLodge]

I've read that this action is caused by a cookie that resets the registry and can often be on a new machine. You need to reset the registry entries and then delete all cookies, preferably with ccleaner.

I'm under the impression that if you do this, it will go away.

Marc

 

[Andrzejek]

A little update:
Like I stated before, Acer asked me to restore the Netbook to its factory settings, so I did it but it did not fix my problem. At least that was the situation just a couple of days ago. Yesterday I decided to follow on some suggestions here and search registry for any acer.us.msn.com and found none. Weird. So I starter IE and went to

http://www.msn.com

expecting to be re-routed. No re-routing took place. I have tried it several times, even with rebooting the computer. Works like a dream, no acer.us.msn.com Now I look like a liar. How come the re-routing is gone? (Not that I miss it…) Maybe it has something to do with installing Windows’ updates every time I boot up my computer? (and where those updates come from? I don’t download anything…) Maybe it is the ‘Reconfiguring Windows, Please Wait’ stuff that happens every other time I boot it up? Who knows….?


Have fun.

---- Andy