@SurferTim: He cannot take your code because the connection is not closed by the server after the reception of the handshake lines. It just reads the first few lines from the server and checks for the connection OK string, then returns a success flag.
@OP: The code I posted is a replacement for the appropriate code in the library, not for use in your sketch. The library is not prepared for a result not being delivered in one packet. The length of 14 is the length of the string the library is testing for plus carriage return and linefeed. If you get more characters: OK but you have to get at least this much to be able to successfully check for a proper connection initialization.