Ok, let's see if it's an ISP issue -

click on start > run > type in cmd and press enter > at the dos prompt, type ping 207.171.163.90 - press return and see if the Amazon site responds that way...

I typed in at the command prompt two separate times. Both times the request timed out - but it times out almost immediately. 4 packets sent at 100% loss (about 5 seconds in between sending each packet before the timed out part appears )- which is kind of the same thing it does when I type in the Amazon.com address in the IE address bar - it doesn't even seem to wait to attempt to load - it will pause for a second, then almost immediately go to the "The Page could Not Be Displayed" Error - I could understand if it was just attempting to load and timed out over a minute or two (which happens on a dial up a lot, which can be corrected simply by refreshing usually) - I can hit refresh all day long (and more or less have today) and I get the same result.

And I rebooted - or rather the computer rebooted for me - and the results are still the same

And on a side note - I really REALLY appreciate the help you all are giving me on this issue. I'm flummoxed....

Ahhh...Flummoxville isn't a nice place to visit, that's for sure..

Can you confirm that EVERY other site you try to visit comes up with no problems?

Well in testing out and downloading all the sites that have been suggested to me today I have had no problems. Ditto for my other "regular" pages that I will look into daily. There may of course be other web sites that I am currently unable to access, but I'm not aware of them at this moment. The only site that I can think of that may be a slight problem is ilounge.com, but it just loads slowly on occassion (and just checked it now with no problem) I've attempted the amazon site using straight IE, Maxthon, Avant Browser, and AOL's browser to no avail. Everything else seems to be coming up for me.

This is a long shot - but check out your blocked sites list by doing this:

Open Internet Explorer
Tools
Internet Options
Privacy
Sites

I say it's a long shot because the problem would appear to exisit at a higher level than the browser...

Another thought just occured to me. In the past I have known about sites banning IP addresses and Proxies because someone using the proxy has attempted to login incorrectly too many times or they have launched an attack or hacking attempt on the site. It may be worth your while emailing your ISP and Amazon to check that this isn't the case...in any case, it would be worth you contacting your ISP and explaining the issue you are having - they may be aware of a routing issue that would effect their users and certain sites.

I checked there and there is nothing listed.

The only other thing I can think of that has been acting weird lately on my computer is the latest release of iTunes (6.0.1something) - when I go to rip music it will sometimes cause my system to crash, which is what happened when I mentioned a reboot a few posts back) OR (which just happened) it will spontaneously shut down. I doubt this has ANY bearing on my inability to connect to Amazon.com, but I'm clutching at straws at this point. I almost wish it WAS spyware or something doing this - at least I would KNOW, you know?

Do you think it would do any good to do a system restore?

My other option is to do a clean install of WindowXP on a larger hard drive. Which I don't really want to do, because it is daunting to get everythign back the way I want, and I think it will be a pain to move everything correctly for iTunes.