Computer Working

I do believe that I've got the computer working now. (People aren't getting empty attachments from me along with emails anymore, are you?)

The computer tells me I still need to download the latest service pack for Windows. To do this, however, I have to turn OFF the spyware, the anti-virus, and the firewall. Oh, gosh, with the humongous number of messages I'm getting from the firewall saying "we blocked an attack again" I really really don't want to turn off the firewall. So the next choice would be to purchase the service pack and install it via CD. But if I'm going to spend money to do that, maybe I ought to just go ahead and buy the upgrade to Vista. And then I'd have a much safer system altogether.

For a while.
Until the bad-guys quit aiming their attacks at XP machines and take aim instead for Vista ones.