Skimac,

Just my opinion here...

If you're looking for an e-mail client, then Outlook Express and Eudora aren't the only ones out there. Incredimail, Microsoft Outlook, and others are available. You can also choose webmail accounts by using Netscape, or Yahoomail, Hotmail, or Thunderbird/Mozilla or a number of others which are more secure than some of the earlier onboard e-mail clients. One advantage to some of the free webmail clients is they can easily be discarded when SPAM becomes a nuisance on the account. Mozilla has an excellent combination of browser and mail client.

mozilla mail/news

If you're looking for a browser, I suggest using BOTH of the ones you suggested. Keep Internet Explorer because there are some sites and programs that will require it, but use Firefox as your standard web browser. It's small, free and seems to install easily and work well.

For a complete discussion about the Firefox vs Internet Explorer issue, here's a link to a recent thread:

***READ THIS if you use Internet Explorer***

For my current preference, I use Microsoft Outlook on at least two accounts, including corporate Exchange service accounts,(Outlook is a little more secure than Outlook Express and is one of the best "corporate" based e-mail clients for a lot of reasons) coupled with Internet Explorer and Firefox as browsers. But I also have web mail accounts at three other locations which I can access from any computer with internet access.

Hope this helps.

Grif