Kevin,

It's doesn't sound to me like Mozilla is your problem, however here is an
alternative program I use to uninstall programs.

MyUninstaller
http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/index.html#desktop_utils

Just unzip it, place the files in a folder you create and run the
"myuninst.exe" file, no install required.

Is this a brand name Laptop?
If it were me then I'd take it back right away and find out why you are
getting these messages about Vista being a rip off.

--
All the best,
SG
How to Write a Newsgroup Post:
http://www.elephantboycomputers.com/page2.html#Usenet
Need your OEM Restore Disk?
http://restoredisks.com/


"Kevin" <Kevin@discussions.microsoft.com> wrote in message
news:203F77C4-1AC7-4B38-A1FC-2FDD47351061@microsoft.com...
>I just bought my laptop yesterday, and installed AIM, and Mozilla Firefox
>on
> it (have gotten used to using Firefox over IE6/7). I constantly get these
> messages that my Vista version may be a rip off. I downloaded the
> validation
> software, but still no luck. Could this be due to me using Mozilla? I
> currently can't even access the Control Panel. It pops up for a second
> but
> disappears instantaneously, so I can't even remove Mozilla in order to see
> if
> that's really the problem. Any help would be greatly appreciated!