i dont know where to find that stuff, i know i have xp firewall and i have mcafee antivirus but i dont have the mcafee firewall enabled. do you have an AIM screenname?

I don't know what AIM is, lol.
Set your XP firewall up according to this link: http://www.limewire.com/english/content/firewalls.shtml (McAfee is at the bottom of that page.)
What type of connection do you have & where are you connecting from (home, school, work, etc.)? Your modem is the device that your computer internet connection connects to.

i have already done everything on that page by making my ports right and making gnutella be in my firewall exceptions, and i am connecting from school, auburn alabama, i think it is a dsl connection. thanks for sticking with me cause i want to figure this out.

Whoah! That could be the problem, connecting from school! Many schools block access for p2p use. If you were using your own modem it would be different. One thing you can try is to forward a port. For instructions see: http://www.gnutellaforums.com/showth...233#post106233

i have done what you said to do with the advanced firewall screen, but it still doesnt work. any suggestions?

Do you know any fellow students who it works for. If they also use LW, ask if you can have a copy of their LW Prefs (ie: .limewire folder) & replace yours with theirs. But connecting at a school nowadays, it's a stumbling block for many people! It's only been in recently that schools have been trying to block p2p use.

my room mate has it and he cant connect either, i dont know anyone else who has it. is there any way to get around the school crap? i am trying to connect now and it is just quitting trying and saying disconnected after like 5 secs instead of like 20. i dont know if that means anything but i want my frickin limewire to work you know.

The best I can suggest is to try to get to know the one of the school's computer network people & ask if there's any solution. There might be another port you can try. I can give you a list of ports to try. But you'd need to change the port no.'s in LW's Port & Firewall settings, & also your XP firewall. Alternate Port selection

yea could you send me a list of ports to try? and just kind of tell me what to do. you seem to know alot about computers, could you tell me how to keep my computer running fast? i have a dell with 1 gig memory and 2.8ghz. so it is pretty fast i just dont want it to get slow. and you prob know how to do this, i have a wav file of an internet sound i would like to play whenever i get mail, do you know how to set it so when i open msn if i have mail it will play that sound? i have been trying to figure it out for weeks, but i dont know alot about comps.

I use a mac not windows. Although I can run win 2k on my comp, it's very, very slow. So sorry I can't help with the sound. I think somewhere in control panels you can utilise sounds for certain purposes. I did pull apart & rebuild a pc as a part of my studies but can't remember that detail.
The ports are in the link I gave you (just click on the Alternate Port selection link.)