Windows 7: Browsers begun to open slowly

Hi- In the past week or 10 days Firefox and IE8 have begun to open very slowly. My email program (Thunderbird) seems to be responding normally. I don't think that I've added anything to the computer other than Microsoft's Windows 7 updates. Can someone suggest a way to sort out and fix this problem? Thanks. _Howard

Welcome
Since its Fire Fox Too, this may not work, but give it a try
Internet Explorer - Reset

If it does not work try a clean boot and see if that helps.
How to troubleshoot a problem by performing a clean boot in Windows Vista or in Windows 7

You could also try rebooting everthing (Modem, Router, Computer). Also, when you say "open" do you mean it's slow if you set your home page to "blank" or it's slow going to any website you enter in the address bar after the browser is "open"?

Remove all third party tool bars if any. Scan for Viruses, malware, spyware, etc...

Maybe run Ccleaner to clean out your cache

I used System Restore to go back a couple of weeks and everything works just fine. The remaining question I have is have I lost the "Critical Updates" to Win 7 that I downloaded from Microsoft? Might one of them have caused the problem? -Howard

Set your automatic update to nofify. You will receive the updates again, in the near future. Install one at a time and test to see if that was the cause.
Windows Update Settings - Change

Yes, you lost them. WU is not likely the cause of any problem. Manually go to Windows Update and after searching for updates download a few at a time. If anything includes the word "cumulative" in its title, download and install it by itself. Afer each group of updates is installed you should reboot and start the process again to pick up the ones you previously postponed.