I personally (and every other PC in my home) have never had one single issue with any of the IE versions ever.
Guess it's what people do with their browsers that might cause them to break.....
As far as windows updates go....
Every PC in my home gets all windows updates forced down it's throat! Not that that's a bad thing though........aside from having to replace/upgrade hardware now and then none of the PC's in our home have had any software issues whatsoever.
Sometimes my kids (teens) would like to run third-party browsers etc. and aren't too happy when I don't OK them........the kids are sure grateful however for having PC's that always work!
It's never my kids who are holding up "gaming nights" among their friends. Their friends are always having one issue or another preventing them from playing games. My kids might hate having all the windows updates and using IE but they love never having problems more than not having FF......so my "draconian methods" are appreciated! hehe 