I second this one. Its a great choice and the home/free version is as good as any subscription based anti-virus I've owned in the past. I also didn't really notice any significant bottlenecks/slowdowns on my laptop after I started using it, unlike my experience with McAfee and Norton.

Most of the other good ones have been mentioned already, Spybot and AdAware do a good job. CCleaner does a great job, especially the registry features which are the real roots of that tool.

I worked a summer position with the government in IT and CA Anti-Virus was great and responsive for us when a worm broke out through the internal email servers. I can't say much about their non-corporate support as I've never tried it though.

Going to throw out another one here while we're talking this stuff. I've been a Symantec Ghost user for many many years, but Acronis True Image is giving it a great run for its money. So if you're looking to backup and make an image of your drive, give it a try!

.dk

so....

I want an AV program (used malware bytes, thanks suicideneil), a registry cleaner (used crap cleaner, thanks again suicideneil) and.....

Am I missing anything? I'm a real pc idiot, still trying to figure out what a BIOS is.......

Thanks guys. If you ever need any McDonalds knowledge ask away:lol:

BIOS is "Basic Input/Output System": http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/BIOS

If on broadband (heck, even if you're on dial-up), you should also use a firewall. It's just a piece of software that helps prevent people from getting into your PC, and it also alerts/asks you if any program tries to access the internet. Some programs are OK (browsers, Windows update, etc), but if some rogue program tries to go online, the firewall can block access to it. However, a firewall is only as good as it is setup/used. If you just say it's ok for everything to access the net, then it won't help. The idea is to research whatever programs it's asking about and only then allow access. The firewall software built into windows is little better than nothing, but there are others. I've been partial to ZoneAlarm (there is a free version), but there are a ton out there.

I am also using Reg Cure as my registry cleaner

http://www.regcure.com/

Sweet. You guys know everything!:yes: