BleepingComputer.com: comp is fairly slow

well computer has long startup and shutdown times
firefox usually takes about 20 seconds to even pop up and then 10-15 seconds to load homepage
there is not much in my startup so that shouldnt be up
most programs seem to take longer than they should
this comp has had some bad infections maybe some still hide but i do not get pop ups and i scan with
avira super antispyware mbam
can we do some system performance scans or some stuff i dont know about to help with the problems
i have xp sp3
firefox/opera
zone alarm ( maybe this is slowing it down)
avast home (new to me any good?)
512 ram
old computer mostly new insides
any help is greatly appreciated
i start school for computer engineering this summer any tricks/tips would be cool also

Zone alarm is a system killer. I would remove it completely. Avast is ok, but I have had performance troubles with it. A memory upgrade to at least 1GB couldnt hurt also. If you want I could also give you some tips for your computing school, just PM Me.

The first thing I'd do would be to add another 512MB of RAM.

Do you perform the usual maintenance, defrag and disk cleanup?

Running chkdsk /r can help.

I would stay away from registry cleaners, they are over rated and if used wrong can damage the registry so badly that it will not boot.

This post has been edited by dc3: 04 March 2009 - 02:27 AM

ok ill rid zone alarm should i get another free one which one comodo is the only one i know
yes i run regularly disk defrag disk cleanup every now and then chkdsk

Well, do you have Avira and Avast on at the same time? It isn't recommended running two active real-time scanning AV's, as they usually fight for resources.

And yes, Comodo is a great Firewall. It does the job Zone Alarm does, and maybe even better.

Ashampoo free firewall has a small footprint and is easy to use, much easier than Comodo.

Since you mentioned your computer being sluggish, here's a guide:

Slow Computer?

gavinseabrook, on Mar 4 2009, 12:21 AM, said:

FWIW, I have had Zone Alarm anti-virus and firewall for years, on many different computers, and have never had it slow down any of them. Even with me only having 640 meg of ram on this system, ZA has not slowed it down. I cannot say whether or not their newest version slows the computer as I have not used it, but the previous versions, from the latest 7x down, have never made my computer run slowly.

This post has been edited by Stang777: 05 March 2009 - 12:42 AM

lj4207, on Mar 4 2009, 12:03 AM, said:

I hope since you are running both Zone Alarm and Avast that the Zone Alarm is just the firewall.

no i deleted avira and it was only the firewall thanks for help