My computer iss a Dell with a Pentium III processor, 128MB Ram, running Win98 SE. It runs fine, but slow in booting and responding. For instance, if a window is called up by a program it will show up empty for several seconds beforre getting filled in, or sometimes my cursor will freeze temporaryily or I will not be able to click on anything, and so on.

Msconfig. and Norton optimization wizard don't make any difference.

How can I track down the problem and overcome it?

Reboot the PC. When it starts up, right-click My Computer on the desktop and go to Properties. On the first tab of the Properties page it will show you the amount of free resources as a percentage. Make a note of it. An uncluttered Windows 98 SE PC will run at between 85% and 92% system resources after a reboot.

Go into 'C:\Windows\Temp' in Windows Explorer. Delete all of the files in that directory.

Go into 'C:\Windows\Temporary Internet Files' in Windows Explorer. Delete all of the files in that directory and any sub-directories.

Empty your Recycle Bin if there's nothing in there that you might need to get back (there very rarely is).

Reboot. Check your system resources again. Have you got more free this time? Tell us the old and new figures.

Let us know if it's any better or just the same and we'll give you more in-depth stuff to try if those simple clear-ups didn't help

After following DJ's excellent suggestions if your system resources still aren't as good as they should be click HERE and see if there are any programs starting with Windows that aren't needed. HTH

Originally Posted by Bear

...... click HERE and see if there are any programs starting with Windows that aren't needed.

Blimey, wot a useful site

Another one for my Favourites menu

Yeah it's a great site DJ, I've been using it for quite a while now.

Thnaks to you guys.I had the same problem and after following the steps above, i had a huge change.

Today tried everything I could think of -- Registry Optmizer, PC Booster, Norton Utilities (System Check, Windows Doctor, Disk Doctor, Optimization Wizard, defragged both hard disks) still little if any improvement.

In addition to other things mentioned I have also noticed that some of my email seems strange -- either no message at all or only encrypted copy or gibberish text, and no way I could respond to them.

Anybody have any ideas what's going on here????

See my previous post and help, please! I'm getting nowhere.
Went through all of the "blimey, what a post" and found none of them on my machine. ??????????????????????