I am sure I always use the newest copy. i still have the same problem without proxies as i descripted above
Huh. Are you manually selecting the "USA (English)" option in the web source when you start your search each time? If so, that redirects to /cn each time and does not redirect when you're on a VPN? If so, I suspect this is China's national firewall at work and you may have to rely on a VPN, as the traffic might be getting forcibly redirected upstream.