Trouble connecting

[beartooth <beartooth adelphia net>]

My ISP has been having various troubles; as it works on them, my Net
access changes weirdly. Sometimes my main machine can get to email only;
sometimes it can't get to the Web, but my backup can; and for a while
today, it could get to the web with at least one browser, but not with at
least one other. Right now, on the main machine, Opera 8.5 works, but
Epiphany 1.6.3 gets a box saying "The connection was refused when
attempting to contact the proxy server you have configured. Please check
your proxy settings and try again."

I was lucky enough to find a mention of the URL about:config in a post
here, and looked in it; the proxy settings there are the ones I use
everywhere.

On the backup machine, Epiphany just works.

So is this a problem at my end, or is it the ISP again?

Also, if I change a setting in about:config, what do I do to make it take?

-- 
Beartooth Oldfart, Neo-Redneck, Linux Convert
FC4; Pine 4.63, Pan 0.14.2.91; Privoxy 3.0.3; 
Dillo 0.8.5, Opera 8.02, Firefox 1.0.6, Epiphany 1.6.3
Remember I have little idea what I am talking about.