Norton is a system pig and their subscription rates are, well I wouldn't pay them. When I use any virus protection at all (rarely) I use Avast. The personal addition is free. You will get a license good for one year. When it expires go back to their website and get a new license. No subscription costs. And its a good reliable product. However. I work with computers ALL DAY. This is my job, and its what I do for fun when I get home. I run NO virus protection at home (other than an occasional check scan). I have had a grand total of 2 virii infections in the 11 years I've had/used a personal computer. TWO. And the first of those came from an infected MS DOS install disk (way to go MS!) Avoiding virii is NOT hard folks. Don't use MS Outlook OR Internet Explorer for ANYTHING. Period. Don't open email attachments unless you have specifically requested the said attachment. Don't follow links from random forwarded email ("click on this to see a cute kitten!" yeah right.) Don't download screen savers/etc advertised in flashing images on websites. And for the love of little green apples run FIREFOX with adblock and java script stopping enabled. There getting off my soap box. So. Avast if you must but know that a constantly running virus protection package is NOT strictly required. You can avoid 99.9% of virii by simply using some common sense. Remember ALL virus protection is out of date. By the time these security companies discover a virus in the wild and update their databases to protect you against its already been running loose for hours, days, maybe even weeks. NO amount of virus protection is 100% effective, you MUST protect yourself as well. (You wouldn't wander around alone in downtown Detroit at 2AM just because you had a bottle of mace in your purse, right? Same idea.)

I use the HTML version of Gmail, not because it's faster or anything, just because I prefer the appearance. I know I do a lot of things backward, but instead of blanket denying JavaScript and allowing where needed, I give them the benefit of the doubt by allowing but turning it off where they've did something obnoxious. Like the JavaScript slide-shows that never seem to have a pause button. As far as feeling vulnerable, I really don't, I figure that as long as I'm not running some ancient out of date browser, there's not that much concern. As for disabling JavaScript to download images, I've done that. Sometimes you even have to disable styling by setting "Page Style" to "No Style" too. For example... here.

Yes same as firefox 3----- no it will not replace IE6 you will just have an extra browser an that's good to have for trouble shooting like now. The only time IE6 is replaced is if you install another IE browser. Like IE7 OR IE8 So give it a shot nothing to loose and maybe things to gain.

I do have a Windows 7 laptop, but I still prefer using my desktop which is XP. I'm much more comfortable sitting in my nice desk chair and using a regular keyboard. I'd love a desktop with Windows 7, but I don't have room for another computer or even storage space if I keep this one, too. I have no intention of getting Windows 8 because at my age I'm wanting to take things easy, not get frustrated with a computer. I keep thinking of putting Ubuntu on the old desktop and using that until it gives up the ghost, but that might lead to frustrations, too. I've loved fiddling with computers, but now there are other things I want to spend my time doing. I have a smart phone, a couple of tablets and an e-reader, so I really have more gadgets than I have time. Enjoy photography, too, so we'll just see what develops. Thanks, all.