Programs having trouble recognizing an internet connection.

Glad to hear that all is well now. That was due to virus or malware infections. All the scans that you did took care of it. They are free programs but do miracles.

BlaqkJak said:

I went into the start menu, right clicked, went into properties and saw "Store and display recently used programs in the start menu". I clicked the box to turn it on and programs are coming up on it now as I use them. Would that have been the cause or no? It was still empty/blank beforehand though.

Everything seems to be working fine. I don't think I'll mess with the DNS quite yet. :)

No need to change the DNS settings if everything is working well. Here's a general internet and network security article that I wrote, it's worth to read and a lot of good information to safeguard your computer for any malicious attacks in the future.

You're quite welcome BlaqkJaq!
Glad that we could assist.

BlaqkJak said:

Again thank you so much. It's amazing such good software is out there and for FREE at that. I haven't had my own computer since 2005 or the internet in nearly that long. I wasn't so derp back then but after so long you forget a lot.

I bookmarked your link, I'll be checking it out. I'm sure I will learn some stuff.

Thanks again, guys. I really really appreciate the help. Now I can play Spore.