Hey guys. Nice words Valis.. your trying to stick me on a pedestal so high nobody will be able to reach me!

I agree though, definitely need extra RAM or at least clear out some of those programmes that are taking up memory. Not keen on Norton at all. Get rid of anything you don't use from Control Panel, Add/Remove Programs. Also, stop un-necessary programmes from starting up. Go to Start, Run, and type in msconfig. Click on the Startup tab and untick anything you don't use and then reboot. If you find out that you accidentally removed something you shouldn't have later, don't worry because you can go back into msconfig and put the tick back in the box. Some programmes can be hard to recognize, and may have strange names like "nvcpl", which is the Nvidia Control Panel. If you have any problems with any on the list, let us know.

P.S Valis.. where's that banana you promised me!

heyya mad....thanks for swinging by.....knew you'd have some input.....I just wanted to verify that ram is the most likely culprit.....the banana, um....lessee.....do you take digital ones?

lol thanks for the info there and help i think ram is the best bet i did the msconfig could not un -tick any thing really as it said it had to be used for the start up? i will remove the norton but whats the best way to stay safe? thanks again

try hitting black vipers site for info on your msconfig file.....I only have about 7 things in mine, antivirus stuff, firewall, antimalware; the rest, like office and adobe and photoshop, winamp, all off....

here's the site; Windows XP Home and Professional Service Pack 2 Service Configurations by Black Viper

this deals with the services behind the msconfig, so is much more thorough.....either way, it's time consuming, but well worth it, as you will both learn a lot and have a faster pc......

thanks for that so if the programmes dont start when i start the comp i doesnt do anything to it i just start it manually it does seem to be a waste of time programmes starting when im not using them though really appreciate the help

yup, that's pretty much it. Most programs are written to start with the pc (programmer always think their apps are teh most important in history, ergo need to start with the pc) so you can easily uncheck stuff that YOU want to start when YOU want to use them; as I mentioned, adobe, office, winamp, etc are all prime examples of this.