If they did that they would have a TON of windows updates to do plus likely all 3 service packs to deal with. Any of those items you listed try doing a google search for them and you will quickly find out what they belong to, or use a program like free start up lite by the makers of malwarebytes. StartUpLite avg= your antivirus is AVG? you do not want to stop that for sure. you can use a process library to find what each one is and does, what ever you do, DO NOT use a registry cleaner! if this is a dell then the dsca is a dell file C:\Program Files\Dell Support Center\gs_agent\custom\dsca.exe DSCA is Dell's remote-support app. If you're relying on Dell's remote-desktop support, do not delete it. but it does not need to be in your start up list. msseces.exe (Microsoft Security Essentials) are you using both AVG and Microsoft Security Essentials on your pc for Antivirus? if so you need to fully remove one of them you should only run one full time AV at a time that will cause conflicts. smax4pnp.exe (SoundMax controls) you can look up the rest of them there at the pcpitstop library if you want. another good free program that can help you with this kind of stuff is winpatrol WinPatrol

a bad update could affect just the browser or many parts of the Operating system. But it definitely can happen that Internet Explorer fails for one reason or another. Then having an alternative browser to be able to get online is a life saver other wise you have no way to access the web. So yes to your question IE could fail and firefox still work just fine allowing you to access help to fix your IE. If it was one that shut down the entire OS then it won't help that necessarily

you can not get rid of IE it is part of the Windows operating system. If you choose not to use it just don't use it. you still have to have it in case you ever have to go to the windows update site or some of the other windows sites as they only use IE. And you still have to get all the updates for it for security reasons. Even if Ie comes up just close it and click on the Chrome icon and open it and use it to go online instead. Mark it as default. If that does not work I would try firefox and see if it works it could be something conflicting with Chrome. But you can have as many browsers as you want and you can have more than one type open at the same time so even if IE does open just ignore and open which ever one you want to use.

The setting is in IE version 10 & 11. Mine is version 10. By its default setting, the Enable Protected Mode should have already set. To check, open IE. Under "Tools" (top menu), select "Internet options". Under the "Security" tab, you will see "Enable Protected Mode". This should be checked. You can also disable the Flash Plugins. This bug won't work with Flash plugins disabled. To disable, open IE and go to "Tools" and select "Manage add-ons". Under "Toolbars and Extensions", you will see to the right "Adobe Systems Incorporated". Under this, "Shockwave Flash Object" is listed. When you select this, you will see a "disable" at the bottom. Click on it to disable; then, select "Close" to get out of the setting. Doing both, you can continue to use IE.