Very Slow Computer

A bit better, I would say; indeed, I suspect ctfmon.exe was malware of some sort as it keeps wanting to come back (I have it on a blacklist...)

Anyway, a couple of observations:
- FAST DeFrag, a freeware piece of software I have which keeps a running tab on free RAM on one's computer among other things, shows that almost always most of my 512MB of RAM is being used: opening and using two internet explorer windows lowers my starting (after computer boots) RAM from about 200-250 (free megabytes of RAM after computer boots and Windows is fully loaded) to about 100, already; this precludes my listening to, say, online radio.
- My computer is "choppy": Often I will be typing a sentence in, say, a Word processor, and the computer will stop responding mid-sentence...and not respond at all for several seconds.

Thoughts?

?

Could also be Symantec causing slow downs, I recommend we temporarily uninstall Symantec/Norton, and see what happens.

Perhaps the issue is that I expect too much from a 512MB RAM computer...is it reasonable to expect that I can play internet radio + browse multiple tabs without any difficulty, on 512MB of RAM?

Incidentally, yeah w/o Symantec it SEEMS to be going faster...

...but not much. I'm reinstalling it.

I should mention that the blabbermouth.net website seems to cause particular issues...is that just because of how that particular website is formatted?

Thanks

Hello.
512mb is a little less for what software developers/companies recommend nowadays.

Well, yeah, I suppose internet radio must be fairly RAM-intensive, and opening and using multiple tabs on Internet Explorer probably is too...

I'm gonna buy more RAM. Thanks!

On a sidenote: My Symantec CD no longer works, so I can't reinstall it, unfortunately. Is it safe to use the internet before i get another CD to replace it? What should I watch out for/avoid online?

Forget Symantec, Norton is a huge resource hog, Avira on the other hand is much smaller and doesn't use as much memory.

Please install Avira antivirus otherwise you won't be protected.

1) Antivir PersonalEditionClassic
-Free anti-virus software for Windows.
-Detects and removes more than 50,000 viruses. Free support.

It is strongly recommended that you run only one antivirus program at a time. Having more than one antivirus program active in memory uses additional resources and can result in program conflicts and false virus alerts.

Hey, yeah, my computer is running much faster now, post-Symantec. You guys are awesome, thanks so much!