Internet Explorer error "connection timed out" when server does not respond

Symptoms

When you connect to a Web site that runs for a while before it returns information to Internet Explorer, you may receive one of the following error messages.

Error message 1

Microsoft Internet Explorer error 10060 connection timed out.

Error message 2

Internet Explorer cannot open the Internet site <Web address>. The operation timed out.

Error message 3

The page cannot be displayed. Cannot find server or DNS Error.

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Cause

Internet Explorer imposes a time-out limit for the server to return data. By default, the time-out limit is as follows:

Internet Explorer 4.0 and Internet Explorer 4.01	5 minutes
Internet Explorer 5.x and Internet Explorer 6.x	60 minutes
Internet Explorer 7 and Internet Explorer 8	60 minutes

When the server is experiencing a problem, Internet Explorer does not wait endlessly for the server to return data.

Applications that use the WinINet API directly will experience the following ReceiveTimeout values:

WinINet.dll version 4.x	5 minutes
WinINet.dll versions 5.x and 6.x	60 minutes
WinINet.dll versions 7.x and 8.x	30 seconds

You can locate the version of WinINet.dll in the %windir%\system32 directory.

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Resolution

If a page does not return within a few minutes, many users perceive that a problem has occurred, and they stop the process. Therefore, you should design your server processes to return data within approximately five minutes so that users do not have to wait for a long time.

You can usually break down long processes into smaller pieces. Or, the server can return status data to update users about the process. In addition, you can create a long server process that has a messages-based or asynchronous approach so that it returns immediately to the user after the job is submitted, and then notifies the user after the long process is finished.

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More Information

Important This section, method, or task contains steps that tell you how to modify the registry. However, serious problems might occur if you modify the registry incorrectly. Therefore, make sure that you follow these steps carefully. For added protection, back up the registry before you modify it. Then, you can restore the registry if a problem occurs. For more information about how to back up and restore the registry, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

322756 How to back up and restore the registry in Windows

Although Microsoft does not encourage this approach, you can change the default time-out setting for Internet Explorer.

To have us change the default time-out setting to 5 minutes for the Internet Explorer, go to the "Here's an easy fix" section. If you prefer to fix this problem manually, go to the "Let me fix it myself" section.

Here's an easy fix

To fix this problem automatically, click the Download button. In the File Download dialog box, click Run or Open, and then follow the steps in the easy fix wizard.

This automatic fix will change the default time-out setting to 5 minutes for the Internet Explorer.
This wizard may be in English only. However, the automatic fix also works for other language versions of Windows.
If you’re not on the computer that has the problem, save the easy fix solution to a flash drive or a CD, and then run it on the computer that has the problem.

Let me fix it myself

Easy fix 50600

To change the default time-out setting for Internet Explorer in Internet Explorer 4.0 Service Pack 1 (SP1) or a later version, follow these steps:

Start Registry Editor.
Locate the following subkey:
HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings
In this subkey, add a ReceiveTimeout DWORD entry that has a value of (<number of seconds>)*1000. For example, if you want the time-out duration to be 8 minutes, set the value of the ReceiveTimeout entry to 480000 (<480>*1000).
Restart the computer.

Note This setting becomes the new global timeout which applies to both Internet Explorer and any WinINet application.

Did this fix the problem?

Check whether the problem is fixed. If the problem is fixed, you are finished with this section. If the problem is not fixed, you can contact support.

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