The cost of acquiring them is often just the time to do the downloads and installation.

FIREFOX

Mozilla Firefox is a completely free, clean and intuitive user interface. Mozilla is also the originator of tabbed-based web surfing, which offers a whole new experience. Tabbed browsing is one of the most revolutionary developments in web surfing.

Previously, to have more than one web page open, web surfers needed to have multiple 'instances' of their browser programme open.

But, with tabs you enjoy an uncluttered task bar.

It allows for one browser window with multiple tabs, one for each website you are surfing.

The browser is extendable and customisable.

Plugins or add-ons, as well as themes can be found at the Mozilla firebox add-ons repository.

OPERA

Opera is also free. It is one of the first browsers to pick up on the tabbed-based browsing trend.

SAFARI

Safari was previously an Apple MacIntosh-only browser, meaning if you did not have the big bucks to afford a Mac, then it would have been of no value.

But since this year, Apple has ported its web browser to the Windows operating system. Safari is also completely free.

From an end-user perspective, Safari really offers nothing of great value to the computer table, but it does have one interesting feature.

Let's say you have a few sites you visit and you don't want any one to know you've visited. You simply enable the privacy mode. The browser erases your tracks as you browse, which is kind of cool.

INTERNET EXPLORER 7

Window's newest version, Internet Explorer 7, has not fully caught on. Most subscribers to Windows are still running IE6.

In the newer version, Internet Explorer tried to incorporate the tabbed-based browsing similar to Mozilla, but it is not as effective.