If you get past the HIP and to the point where you can enter your regular Hotmail login, the recycling back to the HIP probably means that your login wasn't accepted. Normal login for Hotmail is your "PassPort" login, and PassPort login is required to get into Hotmail - I think. If you've made notes on your passwords, perhaps looking under PassPort will find something you've missed. Passwords are case sensitive, and o and 0 and O are three different things, so tiny changes in the way you type them can be significant.

If you have NOT USED your Hotmail account in 30 days, then - according to their recent warnings - you no longer have a Hotmail account. You may or may not be able to get them to "reactivate" the same email address for you, but all old messages will be lost.

The ONLY WAY to contact Hotmail for assistance is by email. You can send them a message by going to http://www.msn.com and clicking the Hotmail button near the top of the page. The Hotmail page you get varies somewhat for unknown reasons, but their should be a "support" or "contact us" option after you click Hotmail where, if you flounder around enough, you can find a way to send them an email.

Of course they can't reply by email if your email account doesn't work, and they will not reply by any other method. If you have a friend willing to receive an email for you, you can list a "reply email address" other than your own. They usually will reply, but often it's not too helpful. Hotmail is prone to "system problems" that solve themselves, but they won't tell you if that's what's going on.

You can have more than one Hotmail account, so your simplest option - if you haven't used up your quota, might be just to create a new one; but of course that means you'll have a new email address.

I assume you're using your browser for email. Hotmail used to allow using Outlook Express, and still does for a few kinds of accounts, but if you're trying to get in with OE and don't have a charter or "extra paid" account you probably won't get in. If that's the problem, just go directly in using your web browser.

Since you get to the HIP - and to the 'cat, your browser is apparently working okay. It's your Hotmail login that's failing, and it's unlikely your computer OEM maker can help you with that.

John