Vista - Need help with webpages not loading

I need help with my laptop. It will connect to the internet via dial-up ( a headache in itself) but it will not load webpages. I continue to get the generic white error page. I have another computer the connects and browses the internet fine. I have read many blogs relating to this issue and made several attampts to resolve this problem, but still can't get anywhere. I am running Vista Home. Here's what I've tried thus far. Turned off firewall - antivirus - Checked network settings, reseted internet settings , sfc scannow , reset ip, checked for any conflicts in the device manager , and most recently I tried re-installed vista as an ugrade hoping if I had any corrupted items affecting my IE it would get fixed. Please help me!! I am driving myself insane crazy over this matter. Strangely enough I can ping all websites just fine. I am looking for any solutions someone might have.

Thank you
ER

And what generic white error do you get?
Does it say "host not found" ? At the bottom of the browser does it say
"looking up ..." whatever and that msg hangs there?

Could be you have no DNS service.
When connected open a command prompt and type
nslookup microsoft.com
and hit Enter

you should get some error about DNS.

I figured it out.,,, oddly enough norton service was still running within my system although I removed what I once thought to be the entire program. After properly removing the nortons completely the program went away and now I can browse fine.