If you use the Google toolbar with Internet Explorer, you can go into it and opt out of the tracking function, as you say. Also, you can remove any buttons from the toolbar that you don’t find useful.
I haven’t kept up with the most recent versions, but it used to give you a choice by asking it when you installed it. I’m not sure if it does now or not. But you can always go into it, tab through, and check out which boxes are checked.
One reason why Google survived when earlier search engines died was that it was the first that actually DID give users the choice to opt out of adware and spyware.
I use Ad Muncher, so I don’t know if you would still see any ads doing a google search using the IE search window. I don’t see any ads anywhere.
Thanks for filling us in. I didn’t know that.