ie setup icons on desktop

I had a new hard drive installed and they used my restore disk to set up my microsoft windows. I could not install my Norton because it required IE 5 or higher. My original installation was a 4. was able to install Norton. However, I could not send e-mail.
After many long phone conversations with my ISP, they recommended downloading MS Explorer and Outlook Express 6.
I did this using Downloadalot.com. It still did not work and my ISP recommended using MS download sight and I did. Everything works now. My question (after this long intro) is what do I do with the 2 icons on my desktop - ie5settings and ie6settings?

Thank you for helping.

 

Sorry, one sentence is misleading. I did download ie5 and was able to install Norton, but could not send e-mail.

 

joannan-- "what do I do with the 2 icons on my desktop - ie5settings and ie6settings? "
I think you mean ieXsetup.exe, where X is either 5 or 6.
Once you have installed the version of IE you do not need these anymore. However, if you ever need to reinstall, it will save you the download time if you keep one of these (the one corresponding to the version of IE you did install) somewhere (like C:\Windows\Download).
However, I am a little confused what your present situation is.
I understand you have installed IE5.x, but your Outlook Express program does not work.
If all of the above is correct, the simplest situation is that you have not yet set up OE properly. Your ISP should help you with this. You will need information from them to enter into the various windows on OE Tools|Accounts|Properties.
P.S. One other complication is that MS no longer offers IE5.5, so I do not know what version of IE5 you, in fact, have installed. If it is IE5.0x you might be better off with IE6 SP1 available here
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/IE/

 

There are some issues between Norton and OE. Check their support site, too.

 

Thank you for responding. My question was not clear.

I downloaded ie 5 and was able to install norton, however I could not send email, so I was instructed to download ie6 which I did, but from a website called downloadalot. I still could not send mail and was instructed to go to Microsoft download site and download ie/oe 6 from there. I did and everything is ok. My question is: What shall I do (delete or save) with the 2 icons on the desktop (ie5setup and ie6setup) which appeared after the downloads. When I right click on the icon, it warns that deleting the icon may remove the program. Do I need ie5 in order to run ie6?

As you can tell, I am not an expert with downloads.

Thanks again.

Joannan

 

Just to be certain before anyone proffers incorrect advice, can you please right-click those things and tell us what their properties are, if any, or are they the usual IE desktop icons that give you Internet Options on right-click?

 

Okay, here's what looks like happened.

When you downloaded IE 5 and 6 from "downloadalot," it put the IE 5 and 6 setup files on your dekstop...IE's default location for saving files. These files are just setup files but they are executables so when you try to delete them you get the usual warning message which is something like "this is a program file and if you delete it you may no longer be able to run this program."

In this case, not being able to run it is a good thing. I went over to "downloadalot" and discovered those IE setup files are "optimized" with something called "Searchalot" so you really don't want them. It looks to me like they can, and should be deleted.

 

joannan--Following up on what Miz has said, and since I understand you used those setup files from Downloadalot to install IE, you may now have Searchalot and/or Downloadalot installed on your PC.
Both Ad-Aware and Spybot S&D (spyware detector) programs, think Searchalot and Downloadalot are spyware. And CNET is not very complimentary
http://www.cnet.com/internet/0-3762-8-20905435-1.html
You might be better off getting rid of them. Are either/both listed in Control Panel|Add/Remove? Can you find Searchalot or Downloadalot folders on your PC (using Find)? Is there an uninstall file in the folder? You may want to use it, or install Ad-Aware
http://www.lavasoft.de/support/download/
and/or Spybot
http://security.kolla.de/
run a scan, and let them get rid of it for you.
In the future get Microsoft program files from Microsoft whenever possible.

 

Thank you abraxas, miz and welshjim.

I found one folder for Searchalot and deleted it, and also used add/remove to delete another file. Deleted the icons on the desk top and everything is running just fine.

I appreciate your support and information.

joannan

 

Glad you are running.

It would still be a good idea to follow Welshjim's advice about Ad-Aware and Spybot both for this problem and to keep future junk out by periodic cleanings.

They will find the remnants of those programs better than you can manually.

 

joannan--Glad to hear the good news!!