Allright, I ran WinsockXPfix and it did nothing. I'm thinking of either:
fresh reinstall of XP (I wouldn't really want to do this)
talk to HP support (the two times I've tried to use them they really didn't know what I was talking about and told me some obvious solutions to my problems as if I was some sort of n00b

)
turning it in to some local computer repair shop (i'm not sure if they have anything that could help my situation. Maybe I could tell them that they'd only get paid if they fixed the problem

).
I looked on HP support for new drivers and the only thing they had was a mobo BIOS update. I'm not really sure if this would help my problem.
Suggestions???