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General discussion

French Computer - can't access US websites

by ljtucson Nov 24, 2004 8:19AM PST

My friend brought his computer from France, with French version of XP/SP2. Connected to comcast broadband - connected fine, got email using Outlook Express. But, thehe only websites that come up are the onces in France, can't bring up any US sites. What might control this? We added US language to the languages option on the General Tab under Internet Options.

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Please be specific.

by Kees Bakker Nov 28, 2004 12:04AM PST

Some sites (like microsoft.com and google.com) detect what language version your OS is (mine is Dutch), or what country your ISP (I really don't know the details) and turn up the appropiate language page. If I type www.google.com in the address bar it redirects me to www.google.nl, and support.microsoft.com brings up a Dutch dialog, not an English one.

But when I type in www.britneyspears.com I'm not being redirected to www.britneyspears.nl (which is just an advertisement site having nothing to do with a certain singer except the name) and when I type in www.whitehouse.gov (definitely an US site) I get it immediately. You aren't telling you do get www.whitehouse.fr, are you (that doesn't exist). Then what do you get: a blank page, an error message?

And, in fact, reviews.cnet.com works flawlessly with me. And - frankly speaking - I don't believe that no-one in France is able to access this site (although very few of them are doing it ).

Tell more, and give examples.

Kees