SSMS 2008 R2 no longer connects to database Before Christmas I had no problem connecting SSMS 2008 R2 to a specific remote database. Since Christmas, I get this error when I try to connect:


  TITLE: Connect to Server
  
  Cannot connect to [IP ADDRESS].
  
  ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:
  
  An exception occurred while executing a Transact-SQL statement or
  batch. (Microsoft.SqlServer.ConnectionInfo)
  
  A transport-level error has occurred when receiving results from the
  server. (provider: TCP Provider, error: 0 - The semaphore timeout
  period has expired.) (Microsoft SQL Server, Error: 121)
  
  For help, click:
  http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink?ProdName=Microsoft+SQL+Server&amp;EvtSrc=MSSQLServer&amp;EvtID=121&amp;LinkId=20476


Any idea why this is happening? The link provided in the error message gives no information at all.

As far as I know, no updates or changes have been made to SSMS 2008 R2 or the database since the happy time when I could connect and now.

Any help much appreciated.
Your first test should be to just try and connect via telnet to port 1433 of the ip in question (assuming it isn't a named instance in which case check the start of your SQL error log to get the dynamic port number).  This will at least prove the server is listening correctly and you dont have any network/firewall issues.