The Gearbox program (designed by Rockstar Software) is used by quite a few ISPs (including mine) and every time its
launched (every time you start Windows, whether you disable it in msconfig
or not, as it integrates itself with explorer) it changes the IE homepage
back to the ISPs, you don't have a say in the matter. It may change some
more settings, but I haven't come across them yet. Fortunately, I'm using
the Aston shell now, so Explorer isn't started, meaning Gearbox isn't loaded
unless my ISPs desktop icon is accidentally shown in an 'Open File' dialog
:)

Note: The above has been edited by the Site Administrator.