I can neither listen to incoming Voice Mail messages nor listen to my own messages (when attempting to play them back), though I am able to check how my messages were recorded BEFORE leaving the Voice Mail recording module. Instead of getting the small Real Player dialogue box - through which I reproduced Voice Mail messages before - I get the Quick Time icon (with its revolving hand until it stops and shows a piece of broken video tape) The problems started after I downloaded the latest version of Quick Time. Shall I delete this version or shall I make an attempt to modify some parameters before doing so? I would appreciate your advice. I have downloaded the latest version of Netscape Communicator (4.08) but the problem remains the same.

Since the problem only occurred after downloading the latest version of QuickTime you can safely assume that it is the source of the problem. Probably when QuickTime was being installed it changed file extension associations. File extension associations tell each file on your computer what program the file can be run within (eg. .txt is associated with Notepad). Before you installed the latest version of QuickTime your voice message files were associated with Real Player and that allowed you to be able to play them. When QuickTime was installed it changed the file extension association for the voice mail files from Real Player over to QuickTime (even though QuickTime may not have the ability to be able to play the voice mail files). I suggest that you uninstall QuickTime and then try and run your voice mail messages. If Real Player comes up and it plays then you need not go further but if a box appears with the title ‘Open with’, you should scroll down the list of applications until you find Real Player so that you can re-establish the file association. It may say eg. ‘rplayer’ instead of Real Player but the icon beside it should give a fair indication of whether it is the right application or not, put a tick in the box that says ‘Always use this program to open this file’ and click OK. Every time you want to listen to voice mail it should open. Instead, if a box appears saying ‘missing shortcut’ you will have to fiddle around with a more difficult and harder to explain method file associations. If this occurs, ask a person with experience in computers to help you.