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DaveIn addition to hardware fire wall (two, actually, a wireless ISP connection followed by Netgear router) software firewall - MacAfee, and Norton AV, I use several anti-spyware programs. Microsoft doesn't find much, but will notify me if any program is attempting to write to the startup section of the registry. I can then block it. I also use SpyBot Search and Destroy and it's immunize function that will block most spyware programs while looking OK to the other end. I also use AdAware, which is similar to Spybot. All I ever find now are tracking cookies which are considered low risk. The most common one is double click, which is used by ebay. I've actually blocked checking this and let it be.
One other program I like is Ashampoo suite. It has a startup tuner that shows a list of all programs that will run at startup and what folder they are in, such as startup folders (All Users and Current User) Run elements, and the ini files. Any file can be turned off here with a single click.
I have also completely removed Real Player from my machine; it has characteristics much like the worst virus I've ever had: always running at boot, adding an icon to the task tray, hitting the web often, blasting me with ads, and re-asssigning program associations with media files.
All of the listed programs are free, or at least have free versions.
I haven't tried Firefox but will soon.
Back to SGC, this has gotten really OT.