problem with pc

[aladavlis]

Hello, I am having trouble with my Internet explorer.It is doing some very odd things.Sometimes it will completely close the page i am visiting for no reason or it will be very slow loading pages and when i say slow i mean very very very slow for eg i tried to google something and after 10 minutes of the page trying to load i gave up.I thought that it was perhaps the topic i was searching so i tried putting in random things to see if that made any difference but it didn't.Another problem i had was when i was on a forum and clicked on a link and nothing happened i tried to open a new tab and that wouldn't work either and it would let me access any options that are in my tools menu.i had to restart my computer.Just to let you know i have high speed Internet connection.Thanks in advance to anyone that helps me with this problem.

[Dark Drakan]

*Thread Moved

Tried getting a spyware remover such as adaware, Spybot Search and Destroy or CCleaner and doing a clean up of web cache and cookies etc?

CCleaner.com

Or

Spybot - Search & Destroy - Free Software Downloads and Software Reviews - Download.com

Could be caused by a collection of spyware and web cookies etc...

(This is just a first suggestion)

[Devalion]

Do you have an anti-virus? that's updated? (you wouldn't believe how many people I have had to tell that an antivirus has to be updated or it won't work, and no, every 1000 days is not sufficient. ) I reccommend NOD32, Norton is also decent, as it McCafe.

Spybot is a great seclection, but couple that with Ad-Aware (found also on Download.com) because there are so many spyware types out there that no one single anti-spyware program can get them all.

Windows Defender is also fairly decent.

Do you use any P2P filesharing programs like Bearshare or Kazaa? Many of these install pop-ups and spyware into your computer without your knowledge.
Have you been to any sketchy sites that you wouldn't normally go to in the last few days?

Is your browser homepage getting changed everytime you open the window? (Browser hijacks are often caused by viruses, or more commonly malware.)

Anti-virus + anti-spyware + firewall +not opeing email attachments that are obviously false = mostly secure from the day to day threats.

[Dark Drakan]

Also AVG Free ive found to be a pretty good antivirus (and free) and ZoneAlarm Firewall...

AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition - Free Software Downloads and Software Reviews - Download.com

ZoneAlarm - Free Software Downloads and Software Reviews - Download.com

[Albion Knight]

Another great thing to do is use Sandboxie - Front Page to surf the web. It basically creates a fake computer that any spyware cookies viruses etc try to hack. Everything gets dumped when you close it. One thing to note if you use this you Can't download things with it because they save to the sandboxed IE.

Edit: it works with FF and other browser as well.

Originally Posted by Devalion

... I recommend NOD32...

I'll second that. Our Security Analyst installed Antivirus solutions from over a dozen of different companies onto the same image. NOD32 was the only one that was able to successfully protect the computer. It also has one of the smallest footprints (takes less system resources) of any of the AV software.

[projectego]

That SandBoxie looks like a pretty sexy little program, AK. Nice find.

[Albion Knight]

I heard about it on SecurityNow, a great podcast for anyone who wants to keep their computer safe and has a basic understanding of computers