Hello,

"Eric V" Eric wrote in message
...
My desktop, using W98, has become slow/unstable over the last 6 months,
despite virus/adware/spyware protection. Specs indicate it can handle XP
(512Mb RAM, 1.8 Ghz). Can anyone comment about the value of the change,
and
the risks, if any, that it entails?

Did you check what programs run at startup? There may be one which
slows your system ...

On the page
http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/downloads.html

there is a tool called Hijackthis which checks critical parts
of the registry and reports that settings to you. Maybe you will
find things you do not expect.

Two great utilities are also Sysinternals Autoruns v8.0
http://www.sysinternals.com/Utilities/Autoruns.html

and Iarsn TaskInfo 6,1
http://www.iarsn.com/whatsnew.html


Best regards,
Roman