First of all... you will never be able to browse a. and b. (in the original post). The redirect is exactly what's supposed to happen.
Are you working with SEPM (the manager) or SEP (the clients)? Are you talking about a managed client, or being able to receive updates from LiveUpdate? Does manually launching LiveUpdate work or not?
It could be that the SYSTEM account (which is what runs automatic LiveUpdate) either has invalid proxy credentials, or is set to work offline. Try the following.
Steps to edit the SYSTEM account proxy settings through using a Scheduled Task:
1. Click Start > Run
2. Type cmd and click OK
3. Type in this the following command and press Enter:
at 12:00 /INTERACTIVE "C:\Program Files\Internet Explorer\iexplore.exe"
You should receive a confirmation stating "added a new job..."
4. Navigate to the Control Panel and open Scheduled Tasks
5. Right-click the new task just created in the previous step (probably named "At1") and click Run.
This will open an Internet Explorer window that will now be running under the SYSTEM account.
6. Go to the Tools menu and select Internet Options
7. Select the Connections tab and click the LAN Settings button.
8. Uncheck Use a proxy server for your LAN (or verify they are the correct settings).
9. Click OK twice. While still in this IE session, under File, verify that "Work offline" is not checked. You can close IE, and remove the scheduled task.
If a managed SEP client:
10. Click Start > Run
11. Type SMC -stop and click OK.
The Symantec Endpoint Protection icon should disappear from the system tray.
12. Click Start > Run
13. Type in SMC -start and click OK.
(The Symantec Endpoint Protection icon should appear in the system tray and should now display a green dot indicating that it is connected to the Symantec Endpoint Protection Manager.)
sandra
ps. I would also encourage you to migrate to RU6a (11.0.6005). The build you are using, 11.0.4000 (MR4), is from November of 2008.