Hi David,
I found the procedure below in another group, and it solved my problem with
Vista and Live Messenger. Apparently Vista's "auto-tuning" networking
feature doesn't play nice with some routers. Not sure if it is a bug in
Vista, a bug in Messenger or a bug in the router firmware but anyway this
looks like a possible workaround that might help other people who have the
same problem. BTW I have a NetGear DG834

Try this:
- Click start
- Type: cmd
- Right-click cmd.exe when it appears under Applications
- Click Run As Administrator
- Type the following: netsh int tcp set global autotuninglevel=disabled
- Press enter
- Restart your computer

To check autotuning is disabled repeat the above but type: netsh int tcp
show global

"David McGown" <dmcgown(nospam)@apriso.com> wrote in message
news:A8B2CBEA-9354-4D61-89AB-EA441FE13A21@microsoft.com...[color=blue]
> Unfortunately, the Policies key doesn't exist in my registry. Thanks for
> the suggestion though.
>
> ""Scøtt Lovegrove [ScottIsAFool]"" <wlm@nospam.scottisafool.co.uk> wrote
> in message news:45631C7D.5020305@nospam.scottisafool.co.uk...[color=green]
>> Go to Start, run, then type "regedit"
>>
>> Navigate to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\microsoft\MSNMessenger\Policies
>>
>> Delete the key "contacts.msn.com"
>>
>> Then just restart Messenger. That should do the trick.
>>
>> Scøtt
>> Live Messenger FAQs - [url]http://wlm.scottisafool.co.uk/[/url]
>> Personal Blog - [url]http://scottisafool.spaces.live.com/[/url]
>> Developer Blog - [url]http://scottisafooldev.spaces.live.com/[/url]
>>
>> xfile wrote:[color=darkred]
>>> Hi,
>>>
>>> My two cents, try this newsgroup as well:
>>> microsoft.public.windows.live.messenger
>>>
>>> PS: Cross post this to the live messenger newsgroup.
>>>
>>> "David McGown" <dmcgown(nospam)@apriso.com> wrote in message
>>> news:9DF2DE6F-2644-43A0-BCEC-C6421ED2DDE1@microsoft.com...
>>>> I've installed Vista (Build 6000) and Windows Live Messenger (Build
>>>> 8.0.0812) and cannot get Messenger to sign in. It gives the same error
>>>> every time - 81000306. This is a fresh & clean Vista install and the
>>>> local firewall is disabled but there is a firewall on our router. Since
>>>> all of our XP SP2 users have no problem with the same version of
>>>> Messenger, I am guessing that there is something different about the
>>>> way Vista works with our router. My IT guy is reluctant to change
>>>> anything at this stage unless I can make specific requests about what
>>>> needs to change.
>>>>
>>>> Any ideas what to change that might fix this? Is this a known
>>>> incompatibility with Vista and Messenger?
>>>>
>>>> Thanks.
>>>[/color][/color][/color]