spycop

A while back someone gained unauthorized access to my computer and gradually circumstances made it obvious that my use of it was being monitored. Practical joke or not, it was a wake up call. I use AVG, Avast, Windows Defender, and other free anti-spyware stuff, but none of it clued into whatever it was that was monitoring my computer. Totally unprepared, the only way I could think of to deal with it was to delete the partition, reinstall everything, and change all my passwords. And during my unfortunate re-education I became aware of software that can illuminate all passwords not the least of which is the logon password just by sticking a cd in the drive and booting. Gee. What good is a password if anyone can download this stuff and get access to anyones computer?

Question: What's a reliable way to defend against keyloggers and the like? Is Spycop good? Are there reliable other alternatives?

Question: I changed my bios so it woulnd't boot from a cd, and password protected my bios so no one could change it in order to use a cd and get my passwords. But no, it doesn't work because at POST one can press F8 and choose several boot options with out entering the password! So then I'm thinking what do I do now? Is getting a locking case the only solution?