Jake of the Web

Joyce emailed me to ask about options she had for anti-virus and anti-spyware software since the ones that came with her computer had expired. Fortunately, some of the best ones are also free:

AVG Anti-Virus

http://free.grisoft.com/

Ad-Aware

http://www.lavasoftusa.com/single/trialpay.php

and Spybot

http://www.safer-networking.org/en/index.html

(Disclaimer: I have used these free applications for years without issue. However, if you somehow jack up your computer, it's your own damn fault: don't come crying to me.)