I have windows vista. I am having a few problems. I can open the internet explorer and go to google fine (it is very fast). Once I do a search, it comes up fast once again. The minute I click on a result, it takes forever for the page to load. Also, when downloading, there are some downloads that will download, but takes forever. Sometimes I can not download at all. Can someone please help me!!! My internet says I have a strong connection if that helps any.

Hiya,
This really is a difficult post to answer because there are so many questions to ask and many things that may not be actually related for example the speed of the website you are connecting to, the time you connect to the internet (peak or off peak), your actual internet connection speed, etc.

Google is a well connected website and the fact this is displaying is encouraging. Have you tried visiting other popular websites to check that they are speedy, for example www.cnn.com, www.yahoo.com, www.amazon.com, www.ebay.com, etc?

Could you also tell me which Internet Service Provider you are with and what the advertised top speed of your connection is (or point me to the package you are on on their website).

I would also like you to pay a visit to www.speedtest.net and click on the Yellow pyramid in the main window which is the recommended server to perform the test. The website will perform a speed test on your connection (please don't use any other internet connected application during this test). At the end of the test, click the copy button next to the direct link option and paste the address back here for me to take a look at.

I would also take a look at any applications that may be using Internet bandwidth on your computer, for example if you have a P2P file sharing application constantly running, this can hamper your connection speed.

There is some food for thought

Thank you for responding to my post. First of all, I went to those website you asked me to and they did take a long time to load. My provider is COX, but I am not sure what my speed of my connection is. How would I find that out? I also went to the speedtest website and this is what I foudn out.

http://www.speedtest.net/result/217661009.png

Is this what you were asking for?

Again, thank you for your time.

You'd find this out by checking out your latest bill from Cox or an email or letter that you received upon signing up to the service that tells you what package you are on. You then take a look at the Cox website and have a look at the maximum advertised speeds. Or if you find out the package name I will take a look for you.

Your Speedtest results worry me, they are extremely unusual, your download speed is slower than your upload speed, when usually its the other way round. This shows that there is either something wrong with the physical connection or there is something untoward on your computer which is stealing all this extra bandwidth. What I want you to do is read this post and then head off to the Spyware, Adware and Viruses forum and post a Hijack This log there. Tell the guys that I've told you to post a log to check for programs that could be hogging internet bandwidth and general baddies and give them a link to this thread.

Let me know how stuff goes . If the Hijack This log comes back clean, then we'll have another look at things.

I can not download these files....it just takes forever than stops.

Do you have another computer, friend or relative that could put the files onto a disk for you?

Hi owen,
I did exactly what you told me and posted my hijackthis. The only thing I couldnt figure out how to do was give them a link to this thread....can you help?
Thanks again for all your help!

Hi Owen,
I heard back from the hijack reply. He told me to remove my symantec and run a clean junk file download and I did. I went to download AOL IM and it was still taking forever to download! I figure it takes about 1 minute to download 1% of the download. Also, I have been trying to install Java, and it keeps giving me an error 1606 cannot access network location! Do you think this has any meaning to my current problem? Any more ideas?
Thanks again.

Hiya,
I've taken a look at the other post. You could have uninstalled Norton or Avast, although Norton is probably best because it does use a lot of system resources and could trigger a "slow down", running two anti virus programs is unnecessary really, so that's sorted now .

I've noticed you are running a program called POPPeeper. I've never come across this program before or used it, but I've taken a look and this could possibly be leading to a slow down of the internet because it is constantly checking your emails. Try disabling the program and then downloading the file. Programs like this can generally be temporarily disabled by looking in the system tray (next to the clock), finding its icon and then right clicking it and selecting Exit or Quit, or words to that effect.

I've also noticed that you have Limewire installed. Please make sure that you exit this program (sometimes Limewire has appeared to has exited, but its actually down in your system tray and needs to be right clicked and closed) when you want to download files. It could be using up a lot of internet bandwidth.

Post back and let me know if any of these two things helped, if not, then I would recommend that you give the Cox technical support line a ring, tell them about your problem and they will ask you to perform a series of checks on your hardware. This could eventually lead to a line test, where they will test your cable connection for any errors.

Hi Owen,
I just wanted to let you know that I called Cox this am and I needed a new router and modem. I installed it myself and it works great! I have fast internet again!! I just wanted to thank you for your time and effort!
Molly