Hi Kaiser Bloc and welcome to D-A-L.

When asking for advice, it helps us and minimizes delays if you provide some details about your system. What version of Windows? Is this a laptop or PC? Factory made or local? If factory, what is the make and model. If self-built, what motherboard? Graphics? How much RAM?

Since this is a Internet problem, it helps to know how you connect to the Internet. Dial up? Cable? DSL? Company network? Are you using a router? What firewall on your computer?
***

When it hangs, what hangs? Just FF or the computer? Do you get any errors? How do you get out of it?

You might try disabling your firewall and give it a test - ONLY go to sites you trust, see what happens, then bring up your firewall again.

If not a firewall issue, try rolling back to a previous restore point.

I really like Firefox and really dislike using IE6

Did you try IE7? That's what I use exclusively and it seems to work great for me, and millions of others. But to the point, you should upgrade to IE7 whether you use it or not. Critical components within Windows require Internet Explorer. Regardless our preferences or feelings, IE7 is more secure than IE6 and therefore, should be used. This assumes you have a version of Windows that supports IE7!