1. You say you cleaned a lot of stuff off the computer with your adaware etc.. so I would suggest doing a few of those scans in safe mode. When they are active by the computer they cant all be deleted and they can cause your connection to WinMX to drop and crash.
Scanning In SafeMode2. Be sure your Windows SP2 firewall has an exception set in it for WinMX, sometimes with certain windows updates your firewall gets a mind of its own and enables itself.
Configuring Your SP2 firewall for WinMX3. I would also suggest that you install the newest version of WinMX, its v3.54 beta 4. This has built in fixes that the 3.53 version doesnt have and may operate better.
You dont have to uninstall your WinMX v3.53, just download the 3.54 beta and replace the WinMX.exe you downloaded with the one from your C:\Program Files\WinMX folder.
WinMX 3.54 beta 44 Make sure your DSL modem does not have NAT capabilities. NAT stands for Network Address Translation, this means basically that your modem can act as a router to allow more then one computer on the internet at the same time. IF it does you will need to set it up to allow WinMX. Get your DSL modem name and model number handy and visit
PortForward to see if you need to set that up.
5 If none of this helps you may want to try changing the port numbers that WinMX is set to use and see if it clears up your problem.
How to Change Port NumbersRemember to change these in your modem or firewall if you change them on WinMX.
If you cant get any of this to work you can do as Allstardfh did and change your WinMX to a passive secondary connection by opening your WinMX, go to settings > Incoming TCP Connections > and choose "Unable to accept TCP Connections", do the same with your IN/OUT UDP packets.
I dont advise this often because there are sevearl ppl you wont be able to download from when its set up this way.