OE Times Out Prematurely

I have OE 6 on XP SP2. A week or so ago, it became reluctant to send emails with attachments, regardless of type, of more than a few hundred kb. I get an error message that says "the server has unexpectedly terminated the connection ", and after some descriptive stuff, it gives the error no. 0x800CCC0F. I have set OE timeout to the maximum of 5 minutes, but the problem often shows after only 30 seconds or so of sending. I can consistently send the same attachments with no problem from the ISP's webmail so that suggests the problem is not at their end. About one time in five, the problem goes away and I can send normally, but next time, it returns. I've tried turning McAfee Viruscan off, but nothing changed. I have scanned for viruses and spyware with a clean result.

In the past, I have had no trouble sending attachments of some Mb. Any suggestions where I can look for what's changed?

Alistair

 

alistair--Lots of possible solutions here
http://www.google.com/search?source...rls=GGLD,GGLD:2004-31,GGLD:en&q=OE+0x800CCC0F