diff --git a/checkin_notes b/checkin_notes
index d4426d2789..fd54e9aa37 100644
--- a/checkin_notes
+++ b/checkin_notes
@@ -3905,3 +3905,12 @@ Rom    28 May 2010
         boinc.sln
         cuda.rules
         cuda.vcproj
+
+David  31 May 2010
+    - GUI RPC client side: set up a 30 second receive timeout for
+        socket to client.  That way GUI won't hang if client does.
+        From Fred of BoincTasks
+
+    lib/
+        network.cpp
+        gui_rpc_client.cpp
diff --git a/lib/gui_rpc_client.cpp b/lib/gui_rpc_client.cpp
index 3664590183..34f5f82760 100644
--- a/lib/gui_rpc_client.cpp
+++ b/lib/gui_rpc_client.cpp
@@ -96,6 +96,15 @@ int RPC_CLIENT::init(const char* host, int port) {
         addr.sin_addr.s_addr = htonl(INADDR_LOOPBACK);
     }
     boinc_socket(sock);
+
+    // set up receive timeout; avoid hang if client doesn't respond
+    //
+    struct timeval tv;
+    tv.tv_sec = 30;
+    tv.tv_usec = 0;
+    if (setsockopt(sock, SOL_SOCKET, SO_RCVTIMEO, (char *)&tv,  sizeof tv)) {
+        // not fatal
+    } 
     retval = connect(sock, (const sockaddr*)(&addr), sizeof(addr));
     if (retval) {
 #ifdef _WIN32
diff --git a/lib/network.cpp b/lib/network.cpp
index ad09aec028..ca4287c746 100644
--- a/lib/network.cpp
+++ b/lib/network.cpp
@@ -90,8 +90,8 @@ const char* socket_error_str() {
         return "host not found or server failure";
 #ifdef NETDB_INTERNAL
     case NETDB_INTERNAL:
-		sprintf(buf,"network internal error %d",errno);
-		return buf;
+        sprintf(buf,"network internal error %d",errno);
+        return buf;
 #endif
     }
     sprintf(buf, "error %d", h_errno);
@@ -194,7 +194,7 @@ int get_socket_error(int fd) {
 
 int WinsockInitialize() {
     WSADATA wsdata;
-    return WSAStartup( MAKEWORD( 1, 1 ), &wsdata);
+    return WSAStartup(MAKEWORD(2, 0), &wsdata);
 }
 
 int WinsockCleanup() {