this is a general request -
please do not specify a proxy server unless absolutely necessary
having thousands of users specifying particular proxies really ballses up the load balancing- if there are issues they are normally caused by crap website coding meaning that the proxy ip is detected instead of the real ip- resulting in a ban.
I give up on sites that don't bother implementing [simple] scripts that detect the actual visitors ip instead of a proxy server.
If you have problems with a particular site it is best to raise this to ntl who can then negociate with a site admin if necessary to get a proxy removed from a ban list- the UK's biggest broadband ISP have a lot more bargaining power than an individual user
