I have been running IE7 (I should say it's running in the background of my sbc yahoo browser, I use both) for about a month now. One thing I noticed when I switched from IE6 to IE7 was an increase in pop ups, even though I have two different popup blockers installed. Three nights ago, I received an update from microsoft, I believe it has to do with melicious softwares detection. Anyway, not one popup has gotten through since the update, so I am hoping that solved the problem. It was generally about one or two popups every time I was on the 'net (generally for about a half hour to an hour's time). I was about ready to roll it back to ie6, but now I think I will keep it and see how it goes. I do like a number of the new features, especially the tabbed browsing. --J

Zep, thank you so much for all you time and advise. I truly appreciate it. Can I ask you about the log I posted at 14:41 particularly the double entries? Acrobat.com Acrobat.com Ad-Aware Ad-Aware Adobe AIR Adobe AIR Corel Painter Photo Essentials 4 Corel Painter Photo Essentials 4 CyberLink DVD Suite CyberLink DVD Suite Google Toolbar for Internet Explorer Google Toolbar for Internet Explorer HP MediaSmart TV HP MediaSmart TV HP MediaSmart Webcam HP MediaSmart Webcam LabelPrint LabelPrint etc? Why are there doubles? I have to log off for the night, but if you have any more suggestions I will check back tomorrow. Thanks again. Carol

I use linux also my fave distro is Mepis (dual boot with Ubuntu) but with any MS OS comes IE and with IE comes the patches so as long as it is MS OS it will have IE and therefore needs the patches. Does not really matter if we use firefox and thunderbird as I also do since IE is part of the OS. I too love linux.

sugar_fl you must use IE to go to the windows update site it will not work with firefox. Which version of xp do you have? is it sp2 or sp3? in xp you should be able to go to start> all programs and see at the top windows update if you click on it you should be taken to the update site using IE. click on custom and have it scan the pc it will then tell you what critical updates you need those are the ones you need to download and install. to find the settings for windows updates in xp go to start> control panel> automatic updates> double click>there you will see your options first one is automatic which means it will find them and download and install them with out telling you. the one I use is 3rd which says notify me but don't automatically download or install them. That way when it pops up down in the task bar saying I have updates I am able to view them and decide if I want to do them then or wait to see if there are reports of any problems from any of them etc. you would have to click the apply ok at the bottom of that box if you make changes.