to zep516 and fredferrell I started using yahoo, but there is email in my gmail that I need. I am unable to get in. It's not that important, but it keeps reminding me that I have unread email and I keep closing that window out. On my desk top, I have outlook express. Thanks so much for your help. Why is it so hard to set up email with google? I read some of the thread of other people who are having the same problem.

Thank you very much for your helpful reply Mikie. I just set and fixed it.Been wanting to do that since I got this new computer in January. Lesley

i believe its 32, i mean we bought it over mnth ago and it came with it, and wrked fine till last nite. so it does obviously allow it on our system, i even went into recovery and tried to reinstall still no better.

I wound up breaking down and buying the new Office but I wish I hadn't. I don't like the layout either but you can go for a "classic" look on that too. I use OpenOffice for a few things too. I like OpenOffice but it doesn't work well with complicated forms and things I made in Office. But I'd much prefer to use the open source items rather than give MS anything more than necessary. If you don't like Vista, what makes you think you'll like Windows7? From what I'm reading, it's nothing more than "Vista 2". They still have dreams of the subscription based Windows but can't get it working right. Surprised? Nor am I? I guess I figure that a new OS requires a new machine with double the ram and hard drive. I'm disappointed with the sidebar. Thought it could be convenient but it's very amateurish. The three things that I found somewhat useful were a month calendar, but it's JUST the calendar, no other functions, but it does show week numbers which I find useful. But I use Rainlender now. Far more features, better clarity, better program. Another is a basic timer, but 1time works just as well, if not better. And the other is the Weatherbug, but I find WeatherWatcher to be better with the icon temperature. So I shut off the sidebar altogether. I run a lot of browsers. I use Opera for general purposes, Kmeleon for email and for when I have trouble with a website. And Firefox is often used too. For various things. I do like a couple of the weather add-ons on FF and version 3 has improved on speed but it's still much slower than Opera or Kmeleon. But nothing like the Microsoft Bloated Beast! So I often sit with at least two browsers open at all times, sometimes three. And running several things in the background. One thing I noticed is the latest version of Opera doesn't seem as smooth as the last several revisions. They had new versions about every two weeks for a couple months. Not sure when they'll release v10 but I'm interested in seeing how that will be different. The problem is I do a lot of tweaking on things. I condense the toolbars and customize it, use one button for the main toolbar and have button shortcuts to programs. I don't suppose that will convert to v10 but I'll have to see. One thing I've found is there was a lot of talk about software not working on Vista. I just haven't found this to be true. It doesn't always load up easily, often you need to turn off UAC or something but I can't think of a program that doesn't work on here. PageMaker was one that was said no-way, no-how and they wouldn't even consider updating it. They said buy the new version for $1200! I don't use it very often but figured a $600 program should last a bit longer and I had nothing to lose to try it. Well it's working fine... now. Problem is, I can't find my FrontPage disks.... and I need to update some websites... (sigh)