[orca-list] somewhat newbie orca questions

[Jason Fayre <jfayre gmail com>]

Hi everyone,
I have been following the development of Orca for quite a while now,
but haven't really taken the time to work with it extensively.
Recently, I installed Ubuntu 9.04 on my Asus EEE PC netbook and am
forcing myself to use it as my primary OS, so I can get a good handle
on it.  I have a few questions:
1.  How are folks finding the stability of 9.04?  Is there a different
OS I should be using?  I find that 9.04 seems to work fairly well on
my netbook.  All hardware is working as expected.
2.  I am having some trouble in Evolution.  I can get around the
screens ok, but I can't seem to bring up the Evolution preferences.  I
think it is coming up, but Orca isn't focusing on the window.  Any
ideas?
3.  Is there any point in updating to Firefox 3.5 Beta instead of 3.0?
4.  Is there a better program for e-mail, calendar and contacts than Evolution?
5.  I am periodically loosing speech in Orca.  I did install with the
accessibility profile and am currently using espeak.  I am planning on
purchasing Voxin soon.  Any ideas?
6.  Is Orca using the latest espeak, or should I download an updated
version.  In using NVDA on Windows, espeak sounds a bit better.

Thanks, everyone in advance for your help.