Windows 7: IE8 slow/not responding

OK, so I've read all kinds of things about others having IE8 running slow/not responding. I have tried all the tricks, disabling add-on's, resetting IE to default, adding some .dll file/fix to the CMD line, and a "fix" download by Microsoft. all of them not working.

I had done a clean install/format of Windows 7 Professional x64 and it seemed to work fine. It was loading up under 5 seconds, which was acceptable to me. Tabs were working great, and no "not responding" issues, until........

Until I decided to install Microsoft updates. Then, forget about it....takes anywhere from 20-30 seconds to load, constantly displaying "Not Responding"..Funny thing..I purposely didn't install any updates to IE8 purposely to trouble shoot this issue. The only updates were those for Outlook and a few others....I can post more specifically later if need be as I am on laptop now and don't have access to my Desktop.

Compared to Google Chrome, Firefox, Opera and Safari, these browsers open and run so much faster than IE8. I would love to set default browser back to IE8 but for now, till I can get it to work correctly, I think I will stick with Safari as my default...

Any ideas, other than the one's mentioned, unless I did something wrong, would be gratefully appreciated.

Many a poster has suggested, and it worked, uninstalling your Anti Virus. Just disabling your A/V may not work. Before you do uninstall, make a system image, so that you can restore if it does not work.

Go to task manager and see what is usuing the most memory.

You can also try going to event viewer and check for errors

Finally, check device manager for drivers that may need updating.

I'm running all the latest updates to IE8 with no problems, as are many others, so I think the issue probably unique to your system. Do you think you have a browser hijack going on. Delete all anti-virus and network firewalls you have in Safe Mode. Then install MS Security Essentials (free): http://www.microsoft.com/Security_Essentials/

NO, I don't think I have any hijack going on, nor do I think it's my Antivirus..but you never know..like I stated earlier, Everything was fine, up to the point of me downloading and installing MS Updates, then restarting, then...slowness...for me to post the updates, all 30 of them, would be pointless...The only other thing I can do is to reformat again, and install the updates one by one until I find the culprit..

Oh, and BTW, all my drivers are up to date as well as all my software. I am running Kaspersky Antivirus 2010, it also has a vulnerability scan, which tells me if I need to update software as well...

I'm suddenly having the same problem. Everything was fine for months. It got so bad I did a full clean install of Windows 7 over the last weekend. Took all updates (which is where I think the issue is) and updated all drivers.

With NOTHING installed other then Norton A/V 2010 I am finding that IE8 is not closing all it's processes. If I open and close IE8 after using a few tabs I sometimes find 7 or 8 IEXPLORE processes still running. Then when I try to open it again it "freezes" for about 30-60 seconds then works. I have to constantly go into task manager and kill off the IE8 processes.

I can assure you I have no viruses or malware or hijacks going on. You might want to check task manager when IE crawls and see how many IEXPLORE.EXE processes are running.

yeah, a few days after installing 7 mine was taking a little over 20 sec to load or open a new tab
a week or so later it was taking almost 50sec

I don't know what happened but now it works fine.
Somebody on IM sent me a link when I noticed it opened normally
That's the only thing but I doubt that had any effect
My only advice is to wait it out and use another browser
Probably about 2 weeks went by before it was normal again for no apparent reason I can think of

Ok, an update for me..I also did a fresh, clean wipe/install...I installed 1 update at a time with each time restarting my computer..So far, it is working like a charm! However, I still have Office updates to install, not sure why these, if any, are the cause...but I will install them one at a time and post back....It may take a while....but I will....

I found it!!!!!!!
Although I turned off ALL Microsoft Updates and I was only manually updating one at a time restarting each time. Well, it turns out Microsoft installed 3 updates with out me allowing it. They installed:
2 x Windows Update-critical update and
1 x Microsoft Visual C++ 2005 Redistributal.

I did a system restore point to before these installs and everything is working like a charm again! I also had come up with another issue. If I was to right click on "Computer" then click on "Manage" I would get this "Contecxt Menu" message wanting me to register it, leading me to believe I had spyware or Malware. I was very careful, as I was trouble shooting this problem with IE8, so I didn't download anything so I didn't think it was anything like that. Well, this also got rid of that problem as well....Go figure......Now I will pinpoint which one it exactly was.....

Thanks for everyone's help!!!!

Another Update:

It is definatly a Microsoft Crucial Update!!

Everything is fine up until Microsoft Updates a "Crucial Update" then it goes to pot....so, I just revert back to the time before the update, and I'm back in buisness. I just can't find where the update goes..I go to control panel to uninstall it, but it's not there..the only place I can find it is in the System Restore area..