The following topics can help you if you temporarily lose the ability to browse the Internet after you install Propel Accelerator:
· Checking Your Internet Connection
· Checking Your System
· Checking Diagnostics
· Disabling Propel Accelerator


Checking Your Internet Connection
Propel Accelerator can only work when you are actively connected to the Internet. Here are some basics to consider:

· Is your modem on and ready? (If you are unsure, refer to your modem or system manual.)

· Has your dial-up connection expired?

· Are you connected to Propel Accelerator?

· If you are using Netscape, Mozilla, or Opera, is your HTTP proxy set up to work with Propel Accelerator?

· Is Propel Accelerator connecting to the Internet?

· Is the particular site you are trying to view available?

Before concluding that you do not have Internet access, try accessing several web sites that you expect are nearly always available. Examples include: google.com, microsoft.com, amazon.com, or yahoo.com. If that is unsuccessful, you may want to disable Propel Accelerator and try accessing these sites again.


Checking Your System

Propel Accelerator may not install if certain minimum requirements are not met. The following table shows suggested and minimum system requirements beyond the basics of a phone line, an analog modem, and an available and active Internet connection. The second column in the table suggests how to check your system. (As noted, many of these values are available from Propel Accelerator Diagnostics.)

Checking Diagnostics

Diagnostics can help you identify problems you may have with accessing the Internet when running Propel Accelerator. When running Diagnostics, make sure that you are not running any other Internet processes (such as downloading a large file), as this will cause erroneous results.

To start Diagnostics, follow these steps:
1. Click the Propel Accelerator icon (the accelerator icon near the system clock).
2. Select the Diagnostics menu option.
3. Click Run.

An eight-part diagnostic test will run. The Diagnostics dialog box displays the results of the tests as they run, along with System Information. In all cases, if a test fails repeatedly and there is no other specific remedy, contact your ISP or reseller for further assistance.

Details of each diagnostic test follow:
1. Checking system resources. This test reports the amount of available and used disk space and memory (RAM).
For disk space:

o Pass: Disk space is OK.
o Fail: Warning: We recommend that you have at least 256 MB free disk space to get the full benefit from Propel Accelerator.
o Suggested action: Free some disk space on your system or consider obtaining a larger hard disk. (In some cases, defragmenting your hard disk can improve overall performance of applications, including Propel Accelerator.)
For memory (RAM):
o Pass: RAM space is OK.
o Fail: Warning: We recommend that you have at least 8 MB free RAM space to get the full benefit from Propel Accelerator.
o Suggested action: Run fewer programs or add more memory to your system. For optimal results, try running Propel Accelerator with 32 MB or more available (free) RAM.

o Pass: Internet connectivity has been verified.
o Possible failure conditions:
- Test FAILED. Your Internet connection seems to be down. This message indicates an inability to establish a simple connection to any of a set of known good Internet addresses. Suggested action: See Checking Your Internet Connection.

- Test FAILED. Your Internet connection seems to be blocked from normal Web browsing. Your computer may be unable to access the Web if you are behind a firewall that requires you to access the Internet through a proxy server (sometimes used in corporate or educational firewalls). Suggested actions:

- If you have an available Internet connection that is not behind a firewall, switch to that connection and retry.

- If you have a personal firewall, disable it temporarily and retry. If that fixes the problem, you will probably be able to use the firewall in conjunction with Propel Accelerator after identifying Propel Accelerator to the firewall as a service that needs access to the Internet. Some firewalls allow you to enter the product name. See the documentation for the firewall you are using for details regarding allowing local services access to the Internet.

- Finally, if you are on a local area network (LAN) check your network configuration and/or contact your system administrator.

- Test FAILED. You may have a DNS problem. Please retry after a few minutes. DNS stands for Domain Name System. DNS allows you to access numeric Internet addresses using alphabetic addresses such as www.propel.com. Since DNS-related problems can be temporary, we suggest that you retry in few minutes.

o Pass: Packets: Sent = NN, Received = NN, Lost = NN (NN% loss). An example message is: Sent = 20, Received = 20, Lost = 0 (0% loss). Significant packet loss represents either a problem connecting to Propel Accelerator, Internet routing issues, or a modem/phone line problem.
o Fail: Packet loss test FAILED.
- 1-4 packets lost: It appears that there is occasional packet loss on your Internet connection. This level of packet loss, while not normal or optimal, usually does not have a significant impact to your Internet performance.

- 5-10 packets lost: It appears that there is intermittent packet loss on your Internet connection. This loss can be caused by a poor quality phone line, a bad connection, temporary problems with Propel Accelerator, or temporary problems somewhere on the Internet. Try running Diagnostics several times. Lost network packets must be retransmitted and thereby cause degradation of your Internet performance. If the problem persists, try reconnecting to Propel Accelerator.

- 10-19 packets lost: It appears that you have a bad connection to the Internet. The preceding comments listed under 5-10 packets lost apply.

- 20 packets lost: The packet loss test is not working properly. Either you have a very bad connection to the Internet or, more likely, Propel Accelerator may be blocking the specific type of Internet activity that is used to measure packet loss. If Web browsing seems to be working normally, then you can probably ignore this result. If not, then most likely you have a bad connection and should try reconnecting to Propel Accelerator.

o Further suggestions:

- Propel Accelerator in general and Diagnostic results in particular can be affected by other running Internet processes such as file downloads, playing Internet radio or video, or file sharing. For maximum acceleration benefits, please consider temporarily eliminating these activities when using Propel Accelerator, especially when running Diagnostics.

- If Propel Accelerator provides more than one dial-up number in your area, try another number. This can often make a significant difference in terms of line quality and connection speed.

o Pass: Measured speed in NN.NN Kbps. (Example: 33.43 Kbps)
o Fail: Line speed test FAILED. Note: High-speed connections are not accelerated. If your actual line speed is greater than 400 Kbps (a fast dial-up modem is 56 Kbps; often expressed as 56K), Propel Accelerator will be automatically disabled.

o Suggestion actions:
- If the test fails because you are on a high-speed connection, try again when you are connected via a slower (less than 400 Kbps) connection.
- If parental controls are in place, temporarily disable them to see if this is causing the problem.
- If a privacy manager or local firewall is in place, temporarily remove or disable it to see if this is causing the problem.

o Pass: Service found at rcluster-5.propel.com.
o Test FAILED. Problem locating Propel Acceleration Service at rcluster-5.propel.com:7797. (Note: Propel Acceleration Service uses port 7797 to access the Internet.) This condition can occur if the Service is unavailable or if a firewall is preventing your computer from accessing the Service.
o Suggested action: Retry in a few minutes; if problems continue, check (or ask your system administrator to check) to see if your local firewall is blocking Internet access through Port 7797.

o Pass: Connecting to Propel Acceleration Service using Client version (number) ee.ff.gg.hh. Connection accepted is reported.
o Possible failure conditions:
- The authentication method used by your ISP or reseller has not authenticated this computer to be accelerated. Please contact your ISP or reseller.- This diagnostics test uses web content that must be directly accessible to the PWAS server. An HTTP redirect to the content will cause this test to fail.

o Tests A-D send text data (words) to your system. Test A is with Propel Accelerator active, Test B is without Propel Accelerator active. These two tests are then repeated.
o Tests E-H send graphics data (an image file) to your system. Test E is with Propel Accelerator active, Test F is without Propel Accelerator active. These two tests are then repeated.

o Open the Propel Accelerator menu by clicking the accelerator icon.
o Select Enable.