thankyou Lukor, after auto update my system was lagging very slow, I did a clear then manual install but mailshield could not turn on.... but the registry fix worked! and mail shield now displays as working i.e. system fully protected.
I do have some questions though. I use online email services only via firefox browser (no outlook or anything like that on my netbook). Does the mailshield have any benefit for me, or can it be disabled to free up resources (and if so, is it possible to do this without invoking a permanent alert exclamation on the tray icon - which if I ignore might hide other problem alerts if they occur. Hope this makes sense.
my spec
windows 7 Starter, 1gb ram, dell netbook, starving student