1 I'm really looking forward to this one, I just switched to Firefox from Maxthon and I love it! Highly recommended. Check out Thunderbird as well.

2 I'm going to say the same thing here that I say every place else that touts Firefox. I am a local member of Microsoft's Architects Council. I am a member of MSDE and have access to every peice of software they make. My blog is written in .Net and I modify it at will. This weekend, I made a rather large chunk of cash writing some Microsoft based software for a company. I earn my living on Microsoft products. So listen to what I say. RUN over to Firefox.com and download it. Install it. Make it your default browser and never look back. MS screwed up royally with Internet Explorer when it comes to security. I run a firewall, and some pretty fancy antivirus and anti-spyware software and using IE I still got viruses. .NET and the newer OS's are nice and fairly secure, but IE6's security model isn't up to snuff. Firefox has been my browser for about 9 months now and I've not regretted it. It actually supports the standards much better than IE. It's a really good browser.

3 I'm using FireFox now. Previous versions had troubles with the standards. So forgive me if I don't believe the post. But, I do suggest using FireFox, Mozilla, or Opera over IE.

4 I, too, would recommend Firefox. The only real drawback I've experienced is with Invision Power Boards. Firefox isn't completely compatable with BB buttons, so if you are a heavy forum user, you may want to keep IE around. Unless you don't mind typing out all your tags by hand.