I downloaded Skype today, and although it allowed me to set up an account and add my personal contact's telephone phone numbers, etc.... everytime I hit on anything Skype related, I lost my DSL connection!

I've rebooted my computer several times now and that seems to work, but I'm not overly impressed about having to do that over and over.

For those who do use Skype, does this sound normal to you?

Is it Internet OR Skype, but not both at once?

I did have it downloaded once before, and I remember having similar problems when I first tried to set it up. I un-installed it that time because no-one else I knew was using it.

no Anne that doesnt sound normal is the firewall blocking skype by chance? you may need to add it to the exceptions list, you can look up this screen name I also have skype, and we have realitives we have cam meetings too its nice to see my bro or cousin or his triplets its kind of cool, it did take twink and I a few weeks to figure out how to add a friend lol but it is neat

might have a .dll file that is duplicated in your DSL file.

This happened to us, when we got DSL. Luckily we got a
error message that we looked up on the net and then found out how to fix it. You rename the old file so the computer does not crash. The DSL .dll was duplicating our Windows registry.

Also our DSL loaded a program into the bottom tray, that is always active. There might be a conflict with that. (I disabled it since it is only used for troubleshooting, when we had our
problems with the net last Dec. That problem turned out to be a faulty router by NetGear which we replaced.). The DSL program allows for them to watch you...remotely.

There are just so many things that can go wrong.
I'd type into Google... Skype troubleshooting, or Skype conflicts etc and see what others are talking about.

I set it up once but never did use it, then removed it, so I'm not much help on this one.

We have Skype on our computer so that I can talk to my grandad who lives abroad and we never had that problem when downloading it. We just downloaded it and then we were able to speak to whoever we wanted, as long as they were a contact and had Skype themselves! We can also use the iternet whilst talking to people which is really good, it takes a little bit longer but it works well most of the time!

Have you taken a look at the Skype 'Help' website? My mums used that before and she says you can just type in a question that you need help with and it should hopefully give you an answer and tell you what to do.

The link is: http://www.skype.com/help/guides/

I hope you get it sorted soon, it sounds really frustrating!!

Thank you everyone.

Ali, they say great minds think alike, and I was just looking at that same page that you gave me the link to.

I haven't found an answer yet, but there was a similar question where some-one's computer froze each time he accessed Skype. His problem was due to an Internet Security issue.

Frank, you mentioned that the firewall might be blocking Skype and I may need to add it to the exceptions list. Would that be a Windows firewall thing, or to do with my McAfee virus scanner. And....how do I do that please?

The Q's & A's also mentioned that CPU usage could be a problem. I checked all my non system CPU's and there didn't seem to be anything untoward there.

Anne, do you use Zone Alarm?

If you use IE, you can add to the list of safe sites. That might help too.

Thank you Curious, but no, I don't use Zone Alarm.....and I use Firefox instead of IE.

'Tis so very frustrating!

BUT........ I just finished downloading it to my laptop (I did desktop yesterday) and the same thing happened. The only thing "extra" I think I have in common with the two computers is both are running McAfee virus scanner. Does that help solve anything?

Koala, I can't help really as I don't have Skype, but I would try searching in
http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/

It's an Aussie site.

e.g. I did a search for Internet loses connection

http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum...fm/836281.html

EDITED TO ADD: Scrap all that. I ran some searches. There's one question in there similar to yours but it's never been answered.

Have you contacted your ISP Help desk?

http://www.skype.com/help/guides/firewalls/mcafee.html
SKYPE and Firewalls.

1. Launch McAfee Security Center (Start > All Programs > McAfee > McAfee Security Center).

2. Select “Personal firewall plus” tab from the left hand menu.

3. Click on “View the Internet Applications List”.

4. Find and select Skype in the list of Internet Applications.

5. Right click on the Permissions column.

6. Select “Allow Full Access” from the drop-down menu.

Congratulations, you have successfully updated your McAfee firewall.

Restart Skype, it will automatically reconnect (this can take up to two minutes).

If Skype cannot still connect, try restarting your computer or contact your system administrator or ISP for further assistance.