Usenet Help Page - Problem Solver

Missing Groups

Missing groups happen for a few reasons. If you've been using newsgroups for some time and a group disappears, then the group may have been removed. It could be that the hiearchy administrator removed the group, maintenance on the news server resulted in the group's removal, or unbeknownst to you the server has changed and the group is missing on the new server. The first thing to try would be to reset the group list.

Outlook Express.
Open Outlook Express, then right click on the news account with the missing group, select reset list. Depending on the speed of your connection this could take up to approx. ten minutes.

Netscape
Open Netscape, right click on the news account with the missing group, select subscribe to newsgroups, then refresh list. Depending on the speed of your connection this could take up to approx. ten minutes.

Another possibilty is that you are using news.sbcglobal.net, which is a text-only, read-only, open news server with a limited set of groups. Please see How to setup newsgroups for instructions on using one of the regular servers.

Under our contract with SBC certain newsgroups will not be offered. Please see
SBC Changes for Newsgroups FAQ

If refreshing the group list does not bring the group back, and the group is not on the list of excluded groups in the FAQ above please submit the name of the server you use and the name of the group to us at
Add a Newsgroup Request Form