Coding & scripting forum: Can I pick your brain? cnet site blocked!

A difficult question and no approach to fix the problem despite a lot of people looking at it. Is there a checklist of things I should be checking or resetting for a problem like this? I'm using Vista on a Lenovo T500.

I can access anything on the internet except two sites - I get timed out every time I try to open either. One is my bank site (accountonline) and the other is cnet.com! I've been accessing both for years without any problem. I usually use Firefox, but, starting 4 days ago when it began showing the "the connection has timed out" message, I tried with other browsers - IE9, Opera and Chrome. They all do the same thing, able to access all websites except those. Using my wife's laptop through the same WiFi the website opens immediately!

And if I take my laptop to different WiFi both sites open!

I've tried turning off Norton firewall and antivirus - doesn't change anything.

The accountonline site won't ping and a route trace goes through to the 17th hop then times out. Cnet does ping and tracert does go through but all the browsers time out. I don't know how to interpret that... I reset my router on the off chance that would work, but no change. I tried turning off my wifi and plugging in via ethernet cable - no change. Tech support for accountonline.com tried setting up my IE9 to work (multiple sundry setting changes) but still wouldn't work.

So it doesn't seem like it could be something set wrong in a browser because none of the different browsers work. And it can't be the website or the router because I can access them with another computer using the same router. It has to be in my machine. But if I use a different router I get through! Maddening! What could be causing this?

Any suggestions appreciated, especially a troubleshoot checklist for a problem like this or a suggestion of what could be set wrong or busted in my laptop.