I am advising all of my customers to use Firefox right now. It is stable, faster than IE, and will not pick up spyware, viruses, etc, as easily.
My tripod site autoinstalls garbage on IE browsers. It has no effect on Firefox.
http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/
Totally free, looks kinda like IE, and it doesn't have the irritating toolbars, features, etc, that Netscape has. Popup blocker, google search built in.
No activex, so online antivirus scans and Windows Update will not work on it. It is not a full replacement, but I have yet to find a website that does not work with it.