[Sir Gawain]

Does Spybot have recent and regular updates like Norton AV does?

Yes. It does a lot more than AdAware does, also. But it's ok to keep both if you want. AdAware is still a decent tool.

[my_pointy_head_is_sharp]

Does anyone know if this is an important component in my computer? Is it spyware, or something I need to keep so that the computer runs smoothly?

HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.b3d\