The "SOHO Protect Strategy" below is from Technology Investor run by Harry Newton. It is an interesting site and provides "Food for Thought" on many occasions. In his SOHO Protect Strategy Harry mentions Apple but does not mention *nix.

Harry says, "I have a simple strategy. I protect myself thus:"

1. A Watchguard SOHO firewall between my cable modem and my Linksys router. You can buy Watchguard SOHO firewalls on eBay for typically $100. Worth every penny.
2. I don't open email attachments unless I've very sure of the person sending them.
3. I run Symantec's AntiVirus Client about once a week. I don't keep it running in the background. That slows my machine down too much. But, because I'm careful about not opening attachments, I haven't had a virus in a long while.
4. I run Lavasoft's Ad-Aware and Spybot's Search and Destroy about a once a week. They catch spyware, which can slow my machine down.
5. I back my working files up twice a day, using FileSync, which checks for changed files and copies them to a USB-connected Iomega external hard drive. (Cost $125.)
6. I'm running Outlook 2003, which has a great spam catcher, to Microsoft's great credit. In fact, Microsoft just updated their junk mail definitions. Pick up the update from their site. It's free. Outlook won't allow most attachments through, either, especially ones it deems suspicious -- *.exe and *.vbs.
7. I clone my hard disk just before I add any new software, or at least once a week. I use Apricorn's EZ-Gig Transfer Utility, which costs $65 for 10 licenses for 10 hard disks.

rdp comments---

• Two *nix platforms that don't suffer the Security problems of Windows are---
  • Linux. The best Linux distribution for the "non-techie" SOHO user is SUSE because it is produced and supported by Novell. Not as big as Microsoft but a major software supplier. (rdp opinion)
  • Apple's machines don't suffer all the security problems PCs do. Most certainly, if an Apple machine can run all the software you need, then buy one if you can afford it. Still very pricey. (Harry Newton - modified by rdp)

I would also like to add a *nix SOHO Migration Strategy to the SOHO Protect Strategy list as a response to the comment below for Mac's.

From an earlier Technology Investor column---

A serious reason to buy a Mac: From reader Scott Grannis: "11 hours to set up a new PC laptop? Try the same on a Mac. They've got a nifty program that transfers everything automatically, with no glitches. Just connect the old computer to the new one with a firewire cable, and click. I transferred 35 Gigabytes of files and programs in just under an hour. Presto--the new computer worked just like the old one, only faster."