Patricia- But Hotmail and Gmail are merely places you can have free email accounts. You still need an ISP to provide your Internet access. If you prefer you could give one of those free email services a try while still keeping AOL as your ISP to provide Internet access. Joan In a message dated 11/22/2009 10:59:02 A.M. Eastern Standard Time, Roulx@aol.com writes: having that problem too, as well as signing on time. I've never had anything but AOL, but they are driving me away and I don't think it is going to get any better. My two adult grandsons sweat by hotmail or gmail and I am about to follow them to that path. It's free and they never seem to have any of these problems. Patricia