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Your question has many answers - or maybe no real answer. IE8 seems to run well on some computers and very poorly on others. For example, EB runs IE8 on Vista, Windows 7 and Windows XP and has no problems with it at all. I can't run IE8 on my Vista computer (well I can, but it's too slow and flakey). I have some add-ons installed on IE8 on Vista, but very few installed in IE8 on Windows 7. My solution was just to use a different browser - I made that decision long ago - back when IE7 was new. I didn't like IE7 and I don't like IE8 - but EB liked IE7 and she likes IE8.

If I would have chosen to stick with IE8 on Windows Vista, I would have gone through and disabled all the add-ons I had installed - to see if that helped speed up Internet Explorer. If you really want to stick with IE8, you could try disabling all the add-ons you've installed. To do this, click "Tools", "Internet Options" - then click the "Programs" tab. In the "Programs" dialog click "Manage add-ons" - and then disable every single one of them. Close IE8 and re-open it. If IE8 runs better, then you know it's one of the add-ons causing the problem. If it doesn't run better, then it's not the add-ons. If it's not the add-ons, it could be many other things - you might want to try reinstalling IE8. If I were you, if it got down to reinstalling IE8 - I'd install Firefox or Chrome and use it as my default browser. There are add-ons for both of those browsers that allow them to emulate Internet Explorer should you encounter a rare site that only works with Internet Explorer. If you do decide to reinstall Internet Explorer, there's a chance that it won't fix your problem either.

However, let's assume that it was an add-on slowing IE8 down, you'd still need to find which add-on it was. To do this, you'll need to re-enable one add-on at a time, restarting IE8 after each one. Enable one add-on at a time (restarting IE each time) until IE8 starts to run slowly again. You'll then know what add-on needs to be uninstalled - or at least disabled.

EB would tell you to keep using IE8 even if it runs like turtle without feet. I'd tell you to use Firefox or Chrome. I think both are faster, however Firefox seems to be suffering from a little bloat syndrome of late. So far, Chrome is still lightning fast and now has a lot of add-ons available for it.

If you want to try Firefox, you can get it free here. If you'd like to try Google Chrome, you can get it free from this page.