The message you get means that
a) you have the wrong info in your eqhosts file, ie., wrong/bad IP or port, or possibly that the eqhosts file itself is unreadable or incorrectly formatted. In any case, it means the program is not getting the correct IP/port setting.
OR
b) somebody along the pipes from your computer to the host is blocking the ip and/or port.
can you ping the login server? ie., open up a dos cmd box and type
ping eqemulator.net
you should see something like ( may look slightly different )
Code:
Pinging eqemulator.net [67.23.190.71] with 32 bytes of data:
Reply from 67.23.190.71: bytes=32 time=58ms TTL=50
Reply from 67.23.190.71: bytes=32 time=59ms TTL=50
Reply from 67.23.190.71: bytes=32 time=78ms TTL=50
Reply from 67.23.190.71: bytes=32 time=64ms TTL=50
Ping statistics for 67.23.190.71:
Packets: Sent = 4, Received = 4, Lost = 0 (0% loss),
Approximate round trip times in milli-seconds:
Minimum = 58ms, Maximum = 78ms, Average = 64ms
if you can ping eqemulator.net, then the port is probably being blocked.
port 5998 is a diagnostic telnet port ( ncd-diag ) and it may be blocked by windows firewall or your AV product...try turning off all firewalling and even your AV ( temporarily ).
Check your cable router by logging into it and see if it has any firewalling/port blocking going on....maybe even give cable customer service a call.