suicidal over xp

we have a desktop with minimal memory. my husband set up xp when we got the machine. since that time he has added some google stuff, and some protection programs.
we are on cox.net which provides a suite of virus protection software.

all i basically want to do is communicate with my friends, view a few websites, and print a little.

we leave the machine running all the time to accomplish any automatic functions. the system is supposedly set up to run updates in the middle of the night. my husband has reported the inability of the system to complete microsoft updates and possibly mcafee protection updates. he has worked directly with microsoft on at least one problem and received no solution.

my main problem is that when i come to the computer and log on to my side, it can take 10 minutes or more before the machine stops going off on some tangent and eventually performs the task i requested, like opening outlook express or explorer. i have absolutely no idea what it's doing or how to make it stop and do what i ask. i am ready to throw it out the window and set fire to it in the front yard while spraying it with machine gun fire.

does anyone have any idea where to begin helping me? please reply via email as well as post. thank you.

 

you don't need to leave it on all the time,,,i shut mine down 3/4/5 times a day with no ill effects,your updates will still get through,or you could change the time for them.
you may have to many protection programs running which could use up a lot of resources.
i suggest turning it off when not using it..so that when you turn it back on, your ram memory has been cleared,,hard to say since i don't know how much ram you have..
you just may have to many applications running that you really don't need to have turned on until you need them.
good luck & persevere you can figure it out )

 

Go to Start then Run and type in msconfig then click on startup,you will get a list of whats running at start up,untick anything that you dont need to be running until you want to use it,leave ticks on your antivirus etc obviously ....also if you have lots of icons on your desktop,remove as many as possible to somewhere else such as My Documents ...doing the above should help towards a faster startup .....

Also have a look in this site http://www.ehow.com/how_2181224_computer-boot-faster.html

 

thanks to both of you. at least it's a place to start. i'll try both suggestions and yell if i'm still having trouble before throwing the computer or myself out the window.

 

a good place to start is to clean house . ATF-Cleaner is a nifty free little program to delete all temp files cookies and a general cleanup . http://www.snapfiles.com/get/atfcleaner.html
startup programs is another reason for poor and sluggish proformance . I have only four in the startup but have seen people with over 20 . They also complained of poor proformnce . this url will help trim yours down . http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/startups/
When done run defrag . Now download Hijackthis . Save it to your desktop . Run it and paste the log in your next post . Hope this has helped .

 

With startup, I would suggest you go "Run,msconfig,ok,startup" and tell us what is checked there. The average user has no idea what is needed and what is not needed Telecom69 in startup so let us help here....great point about right clicking and deleting all unnecessary icons as well.