Be aware that some of the more insidious versions of malware will actually prevent you from downloading Spybot S&D or Ad Aware or may stop the program from loading.

Most tech support will likely give you the standard answer that you will have to do a clean re-install of Windows. It's not as necessary as often as they think it is. Back up your data and then ask around for a friend or relative who knows a bit about computers and the internet. They'll likely be able to help, or at least not make things worse. The "re-install Windows" option is always there.

But definitely get and use a firewall, even on a dial-up connection. Things have gotten dirty out there.