thank you for your reply. I was wondering...I tried forcing my IP under preferences/firewall. Is there anything else I can do to possibly get some positive results? I am sorry I do not know much about computers or I would give you more to go on. I have a mac powerbook g3 and have osx. I also am using a wireless connection and am in a school location. I am using the free version of 2.9.8 basic. I hope this helps. Could you do me a favor and try to think of anything else I can do to actually get downloads instead of this message? Thanks for your help