You will have things, without protection, I was running fine for ages, and I checked with scanner etc., you find stuff that obviously you have no idea about.
Its impossible to say "I have no viruses" without a checker...
I just checked BlackViper's guide, and he's asking people to diable USEFUL stuff... For example he says that .NET Framework should be disabled... Its used by lots of applications (not necessarially directly, but used in lots)...
He probably has some good advice, if all you want to do is have a P.C. that turns on... Plus the major fact is, he doesn't advise people NOT to install SP3, which for most people is a HUGE security hack and ruins most XP machines. Microsoft still don't want to admit it, and thats just bad... =/
NoScript is good... But not good enough for me to use FireFox, *shudder*, If you are using decent protection, then it shouldn't matter.