Strange. That's exactly what most people use and is what I use at work (Vista at home). Do you have some internet security software or something that highlights or blocks adverts installed? Maybe it thinks the top banner is an advert because the path to the images contains /banner/. You would need to tell it that EC is OK.
Nope... I've seen other ads and stuff not being blocked so I doubt that. Although I'm using VM's PCGuard *gasps* so unless that's doing something (though I had a look and it says nothing - it's anti-virus/spyware) I dunno what the problem is.
It seems like something to do with either your connection or security software as it does the same with both browsers. I don't know what else to suggest. What internet company do you use? Is anyone else having this? It now shows people who have been here in the last 14 days and have at least 20 posts. It will still have a few hundred members to choose from, and they will be the more interesting and recently active ones. The 20 post threshold stops it showing people who have spammed their way to 10 posts (or a bit over) just for the chatroom. That's now fixed.
I use Virgin Media. They have their own anti-virus called PCGuard which seems to do the job, but I don't recall much changing after installing it (I used AVG before then) and there doesn't seem to be an option to block ads and stuff. I have no problems with other websites or this one - just the "banner". It's not really a problem for me. Just putting it out there in case there was something wrong with the forum, but if it's just me then don't worry about it.
It'll be interesting to see if anyone else has it, and if there is a common factor such as the same ISP or the same security software.
Is that any better now? I renamed the folder from /banner/ to /top/ (and changed the templates to suit) in case any content filtering stuff assumed banner = advert.
Excellent! Yep, it must have been something blocking adverts on the basis of one of the folders being named "banner". Fairly dumb advert filtering logic IMO, but this is Virgin!