The eye means that you have certain cookies blocked for certain sites. Check the settings for your cookies. You should also be able to click on the eye and get information as to what cookies are blocked. Could be that Gardenweb is one of them. Good Luck to you. :-)

First of all FF or IE are not your servers, your server is whoever provides your internet service.(isp) IE like many others are Browsers, IE is part of Windows, the others are simply downloads and some are very bloated software and bring add-on's causing more problems. I do hope you uninstalled all of FF, when you say you got out of it? As for signing in here, I'm sure you will figure it out, make sure your sign in is correct.

What is the problem you actually want to solve, as you've mentioned several.

1. Get Firefox running smoothly again ?
2. Get a slow computer running faster ?
3. Figure out how to log in to GW Decorating using IE ?

By the way, a server in this kind of scenario is in general some company's server hosting the web pages you're trying to access, not your ISP's server, unless they provide email servers for you. The ISP mostly provides web access via routers.

I am back, so sorry for calling my browser by the wrong name. I understand now it is not ot my server.

Now to be clearer, I had Firefox, ran into troubles and decided to make IE my browser.

I am still not happy, I have a PC running windows 7 and was wondering what do you experts think would be a good browser. Do you like chrome? Or is their something else better? But I am not very computer literate so something not too difficult.

Thanks

Careful with a question like that - it's an invitation to one of the classic "which is better" arguments and partisans go crazy with a question like that. (Just see what ensues here.)

There are really only three browsers commonly used on Windows : IE, Firefox and Chrome. There are others but those are the most commonly used. Safari on Mac makes it four, and in general they all work pretty well. Some have some strengths over others. The basic metrics are speed, safety, resource use (how much memory is used), and extensibility, meaning, how much extra functionality can you add. Many of those are tradeoffs for one of the others.

IE is pretty good now, much better than the old days, safer too. Chrome is fast, also good.
Firefox may or may not be as high performance, although I'd doubt you'd notice any difference until you start adding on a lot of extensions and addons. The main thing with Firefox is that it's very extensible and customizable - tons of functionality is either built-n or possible to add on.

You pretty much just have to try them and see how you like them. There's no downside to installing any and all, and then trying them. As long as you haven't launched one of them and it's not running, it just sits there doing nothing - so not to worry. I have all three and occasionally use one for one purpose, then another for some other purpose.

By the way, if you were happy with Firefox, you can just uninstall it and reinstall it, and that will probably solve your problem. Your profile should be saved, so you won't lose all your bookmarks, etc. However, in that case your extensions and add-ons will probably also be saved.

My guess is that there was an extension or add-on causing the problem, and if that's true it'd be better to first try disabling them until you find the culprit.
That's a pretty rare problem the way you describe it.

I think I might have solved my problem. I googled why Firefox was slow and there was an article explains if I went to help, then advanced, then general and unchecked something about disabling hardware acceleration all would work.

Did that, and all is back to normal.

Hope I did not disconnect something important but this advice was on Mozilla support page.

That "disable hardware acceleration" should be fine. You could enable it again, just to double check. Either way it's fine.

I love IE use it on all 4 of my PC's for many yrs. ( tried a few others never impressed with any) it works best if it's updated to the newest since improvements are made at each upgrade, mostly speed and efficiency, also keeping Windows updates current is important because security updates for IE arrive in W updates.

kbarb,
thank you for your help. all seems to be fine now. I do not know what you meant by
" as long as you haven't launched one of them and it is just sitting there it is fine"
I have now made FF my default program again but I have IE in my program file. Is that OK
also can you tell me how to get to my startup to see which programs run there because I might want to delete some
Thanks

What I mean is that unless you've clicked on a program's icon to start using that particular program - for say IE, or Firefox - it's just sitting there idle on the hard drive, basically doing nothing. You could have installed twelve different browsers and it wouldn't make any difference (except for using up space on the hard drive). They wouldn't be actively interfering with anything currently running and being used.
It's kind of like having twenty pairs of shoes in your closet : they take up space in the closet, but don't affect the current pair of shoes that you're wearing - or anything else for that matter.

For Startups, go to the Start button, then type in "msconfig" in the search box (w/o the quotes).
Then check the "Startup" tab.
The actual "program" is msconfig.exe
In my experience, that tab doesn't show absolutely everything, but for what you're trying to do it's probably sufficient.

thanks again KBARB,
I went to my startup and this is what it shows.
Can you tell me which ones to uncheck please.
Thanks

I'm not Kbarb, but would say to leave all of your Bitdefender entries since that's your security. You may or may not need the first Logitec entry, is there a wireless mouse or keyboard?

I wouldn't hesitate to uncheck every thing else.

Can you widen the left column (Startup item) a bit so I can read more, and also the Command column if possible, then post the screen shot again ?
Some of the bottom of the list got cut off as well.

For anyone else reading this, this site is pretty good for looking up startup items, then getting recommendations. It's organized in alphabetical sections :

Task List Programs

-Kent

pkponder
I am using a wireless mouse and keyboard combo.

Kbarb
I cannot seem to get the full picture to expand but one one by one this is what is says on left columnn when I lay curser over it.
Microsoft office 2010
adobe reader and accrobat manager
apple push
samsung link tray agent
bitfinder 2015
itunes
quicktime
Logiteh download assisatant
logitech set point
bitfinder 2015
weather eye\
smilebox
microsoft one note

I can do the command column like this one by one if you still need it
Thanks

I'll have to do this later tonight.
It does help a lot to have the Command column because it shows the actual program - the xyz.exe.
If you want to type it out, you don't need to type the whole line, just the xyz.exe

OK, I will do that and wait till you are free to look at it
Thank you for your help

kbarb:
here you go:
C:\Program files\microsoftoffice\office14\bscsync.exe/delayservices

c:\program files/commonfiles/adobe/arm/1.0\adobearm.exe.

c:\PF\CF\apple\appleapplication support\apsdaemon.exe

c:\Program files/samsung/samsunglink\samsung link tray agent.exe

c:\program files/bitdefender\bitdefender 2015\BDAgent.exe

c:\Program files\itunes\ituneshelper.exe

c:Program files\quicktime\QTTask.exe.-atboottime

c:windows\system32\rundll32.exe.c:windows\system32\logilda.dll.logfetch

c:program files\logitech\setpoint P\setpoint.exe launchgaming

c:\program files\bitdefender\bitdefender2015\BDWTXAG.exe

C:\users\user\appdata\local\theweathernetwork\weathereye.exe

c:\users\user\appdata\roaming\smilebox\smileboxTray.exe

c:\progra~1\micros~1\office 14\onenotem.exe/tsr

well, I hope I did this right. Let me know if you need more info. Thanks.

Kent,
Thank you very much for taking the time to help me.
I will look at the recommended site , and also leave some alone.
Thanks again

You're welcome. The recommendations on that site are considered and pretty good in my opinion.

Here's the view of an experienced user (me):

Most of the memory resident agents that too many programs trigger to load on boot-up are completely unnecessary. For many, the functions they trigger get triggered when the program is run. On the other hand, I never mess with the ones that seem to have legit system or brand proprietary functions. Having so many of these active will slow a PC to a crawl.

Taking that view, you can turn OFF the following:

Office 2010

adobe reader and acrobat

apple push

itunes

quicktime

weather eye

smilebox

Be aware that many will re-initiatate boot up agents when you run them at a later time. It's something I check periodically, but my antivirus program monitors such actions and stops them. That helps too.

Good luck

Being also quite experienced, I would for the most part agree, except for Acrobat.
It's a program known for being security risk, so it's a good idea to keep it updated, and that's what that .exe is for. If you're diligent about updating it on your own, then you don't need it.
Otherwise I'd agree with everything else, unless you really like weathereye and smilebox and need them.

One more revision . . . the ituneshelper.exe is somewhat user specific, so I'd read the answersthatwork explanation for that - it'll go over it.