BleepingComputer.com: browser bogs down my computer

I'm using Windows XP with Service Pack 2, with IEv6.0, and with Mozilla Firefox

Here's my problem. My computer works perfectly well until I start up a web browser. I've tried using IE, Opera, and Firefox. (Opera I had downloaded before this problem showed up, Firefox I downloaded after) Each browser has the same effect on my computer. I made a post in the HijackThis section of these forums not too long ago, and got some adware/malware removed, because I figured that was the reason. Here's the post if you want to look at it, see what has been done with my comp, etc.

http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/forums/ind...topic=20985&hl=

Not too long ago, my computer would spontaneously restart itself when I opened up a lot of browser windows. I thought it was because I hadn't downloaded service pack 2 yet, so I downloaded it. Now when I open one browser window my computer bogs down really bad. I can get away with loading a page that doesn't have much on it, but only for so long. After I go through a couple pages, my computer basically just stops working. I can still move my mouse around and other basic things, but when I do, the mouse pointer stays at the same spot on the screen, and a couple minutes later, it just moves to the spot where it should be. I have been able to get into my email and send stuff out, but I'm afraid to do anything that requires a whole lot of time using a web browser, because when my computer "freezes" all of a sudden, it either takes me close to an hour to go through the whole restarting process because the computer is working so slowly, or I have to hold my power button down to restart it while still in windows. and I hate doing that.

I'm pretty sure it's just a browser problem, because I have a DSL connection, and I have 3 other roomates with computers that have no problem with their browsers whatsoever. I can use chat programs, play music, and play games on my computer as well without the computer freezing. Any suggestions? Thanks

A couple of questions come to mind. First how much RAM do you have? Have you checked to see how many applications lauch on start up? Have you run scandisk and defragged recently? Have you cleaned up your hard drive?
Regards,
John

Also try cleaning out your browser cache:
Navigate to the Control Panel then double-click Internet Options. The 'Internet Properties' window opens. In the 'Temporary Internet Files' section click the buttons 'Delete Cookies...' and 'Delete files...', tick the 'Delete all Offline Content' box when prompted. Then click the 'Settings...' button and set the reserved disk space to about 200MB - you shouldn't need more than that. Click OK to exit out again.

See if that helps.

Well, I'm running an AMD Athlon XP 2400+ processor. I have 128 megs shared between my video card and memory I believe. I know the computer came with 128 megs shared between 2 different things, and I can only imagine that's them. I also have a 512 meg stick of memory. I haven't seen how many apps launch on start up. Are you talking about the icons that show up in the taskbar, or hitting CTRL + ALT + DEL and looking at the processes? Or something else? I'm not sure.

I did run scandisk on my hard drive twice in the past week, it found nothing either time. I have also defragged in the past week, but it didn't do a whole lot because I have a 40 gig hard drive, with 4 gigs partitioned to my D: drive for windows stuff, and the rest of the 36 on my C: drive for everything else. I've got about 3 gigs left on the C: drive. Should I just clean that up?

About my browser cache, I clean that up often. Not every day, but normally once a week or so I'm sure. And since before all these problems happened, I had set my reserved disk space to 100 MB.

To check your startup applications click Start>Run type "msconfig" (no quotes) and look at the 'Startup' tab. This lists all the apps that are set to load automatically when Windows starts. See how many you have.

Check the entries and see if you can identify the origin of each one - there will be several associated with your anti-virus program, maybe ones for your mouse, audio controls, CD burner, graphics card perhaps. Many will be associated with items in the System Tray but some (like power scheduler) will not.

If you are not sure what one of these items does you can untick the entry and reboot to see what effect it has. If there is a problem (warning message, program won't respond) just run msconfig again and put the tick back to return to normal. The idea is to narrow down what is making your system slow.

[/QUOTE]I also have a 512 meg stick of memory.[QUOTE]
Not clear on what you mean by this. You said you have 128MB. Did you have an extra 512MB added or are you talking about a USB pen drive (also known as a memory stick)?

To answer the memory question, I have 512MB added to my computer. It's within the tower. My brother put it in after I bought the computer, and it was just some memory that he had that he gave me. I've had the computer for a couple years now, and the memory never was a problem before.

I checked the startup applications, and I unchecked every one of them that I wasn't sure what they did and restarted many times. The computer still works fine, but my browser still bogs down the computer. I don't think any of the startup apps are actually slowing down my computer though, because when I do anything outside of web browsing, my comp works fine. I'll post the startup apps here just in case.

Here are the ones that I still have checked:
iTunesHelper (for iTunes)
zlclient (for Zone Alarm)
APVXDWIN (for Panda Titanium Antivirus)
StyleXP (for StyleXP)
SECRETMAKER (for Secretmaker - pop up blocker, ad blocker, etc.)
Wireless PCI Card (for my wireless card)
SpywareGuard (for SpywareGuard)
hpsysdrv (not sure what it's for, but its from c:/windows/system/hpsysdrv.exe and it looks like it belongs there.

and here are the ones I have unchecked:
Most of these I have no idea what they are. Please let me know if any may be causing problems.

ctfmon (no idea what this is, but it's from C:/WINDOWS/system32/ctfmon.exe)
hkcmd (no idea what this is, but it's from C:/WINDOWS/system32/hkcmd.exe)
qttask (quick time program I think)
RCScheduler (Registry cleaner)
realsched (real time program I think)
Adobe Gamma (It's Adobe, so I doubt it's anything bad, but I unchecked it anyway)

bocephis - I've checked those programs using the BC Startup Database tool at the top of the page and they all look OK (iTunesHelper and RCScheduler were not identified). I'd recommend leaving qttask, RCScheduler and realsched unticked because they are not necessary but everything else I would re-tick.
ctfmon is related to MS Office
hkcmd is related to Intel graphics hotkeys
hpsysdrv is related to HP system restore functions

Untick iTunesHelper and reboot again just in case.

The only thing I can think of is starting your web browser and then checking the Task Manager (Ctrl/Alt/Del) to see what process is taking all your CPU time. Make a note of it and then End Task it and see what happens.

If that doesn't show up anything then consider resubmitting an HJT log.

Well, I unchecked iTunesHelper, and the browser still has the same problem. Then I started up Firefox, and went through a couple pages with the processes showing in the task manager. firefox.exe is what is using up all my CPU, which I would expect. Then when I'm not browsing, my system idle process is using the vast majority of my CPU, which I would also expect. The programs that are using up the most memory are explorer.exe, scvhost.exe, firefox.exe, and secretmaker.exe. I went through every process on my computer and searched them on google to see if any were definately some sort of threat, and they all turned out to be things my computer needed to run normally, and none of them popped up as being any sort of virus or trojan. I guess something could be masking itself as one of those programs, but I'm not sure how likely that is. I have also tried deleting Internet Explorer entirely from my computer, but it says that it's being used by another person or program, even when I'm not using any sort of browser at all. This makes me believe that I have some sort of virus or trojan or something, but I can't find it with any kind of virus checker or anything.

I don't know what is going on... As a comparison I ran task manager on my XP home SP2 system while browsing and Firefox never got over 5%, usually 0%. The system idle process was usually taking 98% of CPU time. Is there data being transmitted when you are online but idle?

How is your hard drive organised? You said earlier windows was on D: partition and you had about 3GB left on C:? I'd recommend scandisk and defrag of both drives from safe mode - especially since you drive was a little suspect during your HJT analysis. You said you were looking at replacing the drive have you done that?

Well, when I browse with Firefox, it will jump up to over 60 or 70% CPU usage at times. When I'm doing nothing and I have firefox open, the system idle takes up about 96 or 97% of the CPU time. but once I move my mouse around in the firefox window, firefox uses up to 20% of the CPU time, and that's just from moving my mouse around in the browser window.

I do have a D: partition that has all the windows stuff on it. and on my C: drive, I have about 3 gigs left. I've got 40 gigs total. I did scandisk and defrag on both of them a couple weeks ago, and they didn't help any. I did them again last night, and as far as I can tell, there's no change. I haven't replaced the hard drive yet, because I'm a poor college student, and I don't have enough money to do that If that's what you think it may be then I'll bump that up on my list of priorities though.