A while back I posted an issue I had with Windows XP Pro and it not properly releasing connections when I forced a disconnect. This problem did not exist when I ran Windows 2000 Professional or any other MS operating system.
It also was not happening to a co-worker of mine who was running XP Pro as well.
Then last night a savior appeared on my Instant Messenger. Our own
Kinguni was able to successfully resolve my issue. Now, I have not spent much time in the forums as of late, so I may be just repeating what is already known but I wish to publicly thank King for his help.
The problem -
Windows XP and ZoneAlarm do not play well together.With ZA running (I have the Pro version) when I disconnected any type of connection (either DSL or dial-up) it would not completely release the resources bound to the adapter. All the IP address' would be zeroed out but the bindings to the last used adapter were still active. Thus, I could never reconnect with either the last used connection type or with the other adapter.
The only way to clear was to reboot. Not something I really want to do because I spend much time switching back and forth between the two connection types.
So, based on King's recommendation I un-installed ZoneAlarm and installed
Tiny Personal Firewall 2.0!
After install I checked both the connections and finally it worked! TCP/IP resources were released as they should be. Connect/reconnect issues were gone!
Again - thanks King for all your assistance - you saved me from going prematurely bald!