a big plea....

Having resisted all attempts from collegues to change my browser I finally succumbed last night when after 7 consecutive pop ups on my IE 6xx, in sheer frustration I down loaded Mozzilla Firebird after reading encouraging posts on RHP - the clincher being a recommendation from Russ - that Holy upon high.
I have RealDownload to manage such extractions and fully expected it to self install but it didn't and opening the download from 'programme files' is a dead end as there doesn't appear to be any .exe folder.
Stumped, and I really don't want to get into that very scary part of regedit to have to change my default browser.
OS is ME ( OEM - not upgrade ) and I would like to be able to retain Outlook express if poss.

Any help from the IT guru's on RHP will be enormously received and I just know that the solution is going to be ridiculously obvious.

BR's from the skeeter and I really don't mind the blonde jokes. 😵

Don't bother to switch.

Most sites are optimized for IE anyways and your best experience will almost always occur in IE. I know I am biased but I have used Mozilla extensively and although I like the tabbed browsing, mozilla tends to crash a lot more for me.

Regarding pop up stopping, it can be accomplished trivially by adding the google toolbar.

http://toolbar.google.com/

The Google bar will solve your problem ( I use this with IE too) – it is very effective at stopping the dreaded pop-ups– but be aware that it does send all your browsing habits back to Google HQ. (This can be disabled though) Of course, this is positive thing if you spend all your time on RHP, as that should raise the site profile… 🙂

-Russ

I've always stopped pop-ups by setting my IE security settings to 'high'. (tools - internet options - security - custom level). This also can stop some viral attacks I believe, but it's no replacement for a good firewall & virus scanner. Propper teccies will be able to tell you if it's a good idea or not in general.

There are disadvantages to my technique though - you have to alter 2 or 3 of the settings manually or you won't be able to download files etc. And a few sites that intrinsically require Java & cookies won't work unless you reset the security to 'medium'. Like this one!

I find the extra 20 seconds work to switch back & forth between security settings worth the extra privacy & control though.

When using IE, I use "Freesurfer mkII", a freeware utility that stop the pop ups, but doesn't do silly spyware stuff in the background (in fact, truies to stop that too!)
http://www.kolumbus.fi/eero.muhonen/FS/fs.htm

If your a telewest broadband customer, goto the blueyonder home page within the next few weeks, and they've got a free offer on a commertial level stopper. Can't recall its name, but seems OK.