Icon, my post was actually directed at Flame, so sorry if I've confused you. Also, there is no need to quote everything that is said: normally a thread like this flows (well, "moves roughly in the one direction" is more accurate) like a conversation, where one person says something or a few things and then you respond. As you've probably seen, this isn't often the case which is where the quote tags come in.
Not a telling off - it's just that I'm beginning to get a little square-eyed...
Flame, you've completely missed the point I was making. On the free programs front, I've pointed to various Linux ports in the past that are excellent, and it's not entirely difficult to find decent AV software for free. No, they may not have some of the features of some commercial apps, but do you really need them? If it's just a case of "it might be handy", does that really warrent you shelling out £30? I guess it's down to the user, but I find that quite a few freebie AV apps (AVG in particular) are perfectly cabable of sorting you out.
As for the firewall, I agree. It's vital to have one so that the script kiddies (by and by, read
this to find out what a hacker really is - you'd probably be disappointed) can't screw with your PC. What I was saying was that the likelyhoods of this being the root cause of Icon's problem was highly unlikely, and that I was very confused as to how you actually came to that conclusion. Even with your reasoning I still feel it's a very unlikely scenario.
I'm still putting money on a conflict of some sort. But I'll leave you guys to work that out for yourselves.
