Hi DJ.

Well when the hourglass mouse icon pops up that means a process is being started/run 
so you need to know what this process is.

When you first start you computer up and its showing the desktop only do a Ctrl+Alt+Del 
to see the list of processes running. You only need two to use Windows efficiently 
that Systray and Explorer. That doesn't mean Windows Explorer either.

With 128Mb RAM you need to save as much memory as you can. As of this weekend I'm 
now running WinME so I can't give you a list of what I'm running. I bet you have 
a virus checker running all the time, yes? They are very memory hungry. Do you need 
it running all the time? You don't, if you been given a file or downloaded something 
of the web just have your virus checker check those files.

To see what is processed to run as Windows starts up just Run: msconfig and 
look in the Startup tab. You will see Systray listed and possibly Loadgm.exe, thats 
only used for MSN. If you don't use it then remove the checkmark. You should see 
ScanRegistry this is only used to backup your registry each time your computer starts 
up on a new day, so leave that one.

If you want to get a bit technical then make a note of the exe names that are running 
on startup and do a search of your hard drive for these names. When you find one 
just highlight it and press Alt+Enter to bring up the properties. It will tell you 
who made the exe and some indication of what it does. If it looks iffy the just remove 
the checkmark from msconfig, you can always put it back is something doesn't work 
right.

I would also do a full virus scan just in case something as slipped through without 
you knowing.

An excellent program that I would recommend to any Windows user is Uninstall 
Manager 4.3. Its a bad name for the exe because it doesn't unistall anything, 
it just puts unwanted files in the recycle bin. It checks the contents of your hard 
drive and the next time you check it tells you what extra files have been added. 
Showing their location and time and date, so you can tell is something has been installed 
without your knowledge. I've used this program for the last 4 years and its great. 
You can also excluded certain folders that are always being added to e.g. cookies, 
temporary internet files and recent documents. You can also do a system restore.

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