stuck-in-mud Internet Explorer

Please forgive if all wrong - my second post!

I am on phone dialup (Ugh!)
Access to Internet explorer was always brisk - but no longer now!
Used to open (BBC news) in 7 seconds (Bt dialup time)
In 2 seconds if already on line.

Now SOMETIMES opens, but often sticks doing nowt but egg-timing.

Yet if I RESTART the computer it accesses IE really quick

Also I have noticed of late that it I open IE WITHOUT phone connection it reminds me (for 1/4 sec!) before hiding it! (It says dial up if I were only quick enough to read it!)
Also if I AM sconnected (say for emails) it STILL says "connect" or words to that effect

It seems that the "permanent egg-times" is a symptom of "Not being connected"
Under "tools" there is an "option" that either ticks or does not tick "work offline" which it ticks or not at random without consulting me!

As I say the only SURE solution is to RESTART my computer before EVERY attempt to open IE.
It is of course driving me bonkers!
Thanks for your ideas, help and interest

Sorry, Bill G does not want me to be able to send you details of how my m/c is set up. He hides behind undefined words like "performance" and "services"

Run a spyware scan on your PC if you have not already.

Adaware is as good as any adn can be got at http://www.lavasoftusa.com/products/...e_personal.php

Have you recently installed any new network related hardware? Say a wireless or bluetooth device? Or drivers for a mobile phone?

I have prevx installed - status green. It has been there for years.

The only "new" things I ever install are Bill G's bodge patchups (Updates!!!) which ALWAYS cause trouble.

Don't even know what the other things you mention are.

Am I going about "replying to your helpful reply" in the right way, z80?

Try ditching IE in favour of Firefox (google will help). It's better...

If over time the responsiveness of your machine degrades over time after startup it may be that you don't have enough RAM.

How much RAM have you? You can check your available ram in system properties.

z80 = my fav processor

250 MB of RAM

It is to do with my dialups - IE thinking it is not on line when it is and not telling me.,

At present I have only dialup and access to you running and once again NOTHING happened on the first TWO attempts to open IE but, as usual, the THIRD attempt was quick and fine.
What could be different on the THIRD attempt.
It is only quick these days on the third attempt or if I shut down and restart the computer to ensure it is the very first attempt before whatever happens happens.

Bit of a strange one...

Is there anything in the event logs to suggest any problems?

z80 was great yep :)

Hello Z80

It is summat to do with Bill Gates taking MULTIPLE copies of progs and running them all at once (and thus running outa workspace!)
As he does not tell me what he is doing, nor WARN me when workspace is running short, all I can say is experiment shows that shutting down and restarting clears the speed problem.

An hour after discovering this (for Internat Explorer access) I was adding data to a several MB Excel prog and it froze up COMPLETELY. HAD TO remove electric supply to get it to clear the knicker-twist it had goit itself into!
(That freeze-up was COMPLETELY repeatable - at exactly the same point each time - I soon learned to save the file at the point where I knew the next keystroke would lock everything up solid!)

That problem has now gone away (after I checked the C drive not need defragging and deleted a few MB from the recycle bin. Maybe it was an electric supply glitch.

How do I get Bill to TELL me when windows workspace is getting exhausted AND WHY!