IE6 (XP SP2) hangs all apps (100% CPU) on each page load

[Chris/Power Salad]

At first I thought it was just eBay being busy but I opened Task
Manager and watched iexplore.exe jump up into the high 90s each time I
wanted to eother reload a page or surf somewhere else. I run AdAware
and Spybot at least weekly, and have disabled most of the Add-Ons in
IE. This has been going on a long time and is of course negating the
whole DSL thing, it is taking some pages up to a minute to load,
during which time I get the white-rectangle "not responding" icon and
anything else I may be doing on the computer hangs as well while IE
eats up the CPU, then it drops back suddenly. Anything else I should
be looking for? Any help appreciated.

 

[S. Taylor]

That could be an indicator that BHO's are busy doing something each time IE
loads, an new IE window open, etc.

Get and use a tool that'll let you browse your list of BHO's and installed
activex objects.
Uninstall any that you can do without or that you don't remember installing
intentionally.

 

[Chris/Power Salad]

Get and use a tool that'll let you browse your list of BHO's and installed
activex objects. Uninstall any that you can do without or that you don't remember installing
intentionally.

Thank you - what programs would this include? Or should I run a
HijackThis log?

 

[Leythos]

Thank you - what programs would this include? Or should I run a
HijackThis log?

Just don't post the HJ logs here - there are a zillion on-line HJ forums
specifically supporting the posting of HJ logs. It's against the groups
charter to post HJ logs.

 

[Chris/Power Salad]

Just don't post the HJ logs here - there are a zillion on-line HJ forums
specifically supporting the posting of HJ logs. It's against the groups
charter to post HJ logs.

This does not answer my question. I asked whether I should run a HJ
log or not in this instance based on the problem I'm having.

If anyone has any constructive help to offer I would appreciate it,
thank you.

 

[Leythos]

This does not answer my question. I asked whether I should run a HJ
log or not in this instance based on the problem I'm having.

If anyone has any constructive help to offer I would appreciate it,
thank you.

With all the links (to vendors sites) you don't really think that you
have to ask if you should run any of them do you? Install several as
none of them actually fix everything, run them, follow their directions,
and do what they say.

I've not seen Spy Bot Search & Destroy or AdAware trash a machine, and
HiJack can if you don't follow directions.....

Just install the tools, run them, and post your HJ logs to the HJ forums
to get someone to help you with them.

Here are the links to the tools you should be using:

Only download software you can validate as uncompromised - in the case
of non-vendor site you have no guarantee that the files are unmodified
or uncompromised. Anyone providing a link to a non-vendors site with a
direct download should not be trusted, the vendors sites are the safest
place to download their application.

Always remember - only download files from Trusted Sites.

After you install any of these applications and update them, run them in
SAFE MODE to allow them to properly clean your system.

These sites are for downloading Anti-Spyware tools, in order that I
would use them myself:

AdAwareSE can be found here:
http://www.lavasoft.de/support/download/

SpyBot Search and Destroy can be found here:
http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download/index.html

HiJack can be found here:
http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/downloads.html

Ewido Security Suite Trial can be found here:
http://www.ewido.net/en/download/

CrapCleaner can be found at the vendors site here:
http://www.ccleaner.com/ccdownload.asp

CleanUp can be found at the vendors site here:
http://www.stevengould.org/software/cleanup/download.html
or from another reputable source:
http://www.tucows.com/get/405276_152071

The following are two links to Antivirus software in order that I would
use them:

You can also download Symantec Trial version of their Antivirus software
from here:
http://www.symantec.com/downloads/

Download AVG Personal Free edition from here:
http://free.grisoft.com/freeweb.php/doc/2/

These are the actual vendors sites, not some unknown or authorized no-
name site. They also don't artificially increase the hits for sites that
get paid for the amount of traffic they can generate like one poster has
admitted to in this group.

Accoding to PCBUTTS1
The authors of the above programs, with the exception of Microsoft has given
the owner of pcbutts1.com express written permission to redistribute their
software FROM HIS WEBSITE DIRECTLY.

Except he can't prove it and none of them validate his statement.

 

[S. Taylor]

The links Leythos lists in his reply further down are good.
I've never used HijackThis, so i couldn't recomend much from its logs.

I do use Spybot Search & Destroy and can say that it's a very good good
resource.
and can show you your startup items, BHO's, installed ActiveX, running
processes, Hosts
file, etc., so you have a chance of identifying unknown software.
Spybot can also, automatically, block attempts to automatically install
known
malicious software and block redirections and the such, to known dangerous
websites
But Spybot doesn't detect everything, so you should use multiple programs
with overlapping
protection.
You can use Spybot to identify programs that load unknowngly,
by viewing the Start Up Item & BHO's tool, then locating the files and
viewing thier properties.
Any files that have no Version & Company info listed can be manualy moved to
another folder,
where they can't be found be the system and loaded, until you're sure that
deleting them won't have
negative consequences ( i.e make sure the folder you move them to isn't
listed in the PATH
enviroment variable )

You can use the google toolbar to block pop ups
and I'd suggest that you either disable .hta's or the Windows Scripting
host,
since IE can be tricked into running them.