Computers at early voting sites in four states (so far) fail to connect to the electronic poll books at the central office. Voting is delayed by many hours and many voters have to leave, hopefully to come back later and vote.

The three polling sites were back online by Monday afternoon after a problem with phone lines, officials said. When voters arrived at 8 a.m. to cast their ballots at Wetmore Elementary School, Blattman Elementary School and Johnson Library, computers were having trouble dialing up phone lines that access voter registration information. But according to election officials, a backup program was used, and a half-hour later, the problem was fixed.

In Hillsborough and Pinellas counties on Monday, voters simmered and election staff laptops sat idle when computer service was lost for up to three hours.

Some people were angry as they stood in line for more than an hour to vote at a polling place in a Denver supermarket because officials could not connect their laptop computers to databases set up to prevent voter fraud.

Voter John Seifert, 68, said a half dozen people had to leave without casting a ballot. "The rest of us are obstinate, and we'll stay here until hell freezes over," he said..

Davidson did not return phone calls seeking comment.

...Poll workers use PCs to communicate with the downtown election commission database to verify and input voter registration information.

The computers containing the voter registration rolls apparently lost their connection with the main computer for about 30 minutes, said Parten and Steve Smith, the county official responsible for the computer system.