The search button won't activate until you are connected to the network, and there are lots of reasons connections won't be accepted or are getting blocked. Most of the connections problems/solutions are in the connections forum http://www.gnutellaforums.com/forumd...?s=&forumid=22

Look especially for posts by the LW team --there's hope some new code will help.

In the meantime, if you know the IP and port of a friend running as an Ultrapeer, try entering that number in the connections pane.