video will not work, mtv.com, some work if website is changed from .edu to .com

I never had this problem where mtv.com or blackboard.luc.edu did not work.  I am using both ie 7.0 and mozilla firefox as my browsers.  Dell Inspiron 6400 Intel T2400. Those two websites worked fine before.  Mtv.com i can reach but the flash version won't work (no video or pictures show up)..on the html version of mtv.com, pictures show up but video doesn't work.  I have downloaded and installed the latest flash software as well as am sure that javascript is working fine.  As for blackboard, i could access blackboard.luc.edu before but now i cannot access the specific site using either firefox or ie.  This is a specific issue with my computer as other computers are able to access that site.  However, i have found that i can access blackboard by going to luc.blackboard.com. 

Any ideas as to how this is and how i can fix these two issues?  Also, i have discovered that my original windows xp games mysteriously disappeared (minesweeper, solitaire, etc) but i have reinstalled them...could this be related?

I am using ad-aware se and kaspersky internet security now to check out if any warez are the culprit and i also use diskeeper to defragment my computer.