Let me ask you a few basic questions:

How old is your computer?

Do you know which internet browser you are using (Internet Explorer, Netscap or maybe even AOL)?

In addition to the browser upgrade, a little more RAM could make a big difference. When your system runs low on physical memory, or RAM, it struggles to write temporary data to virtual memory on the hard drive all the time. This slows things down allot especially on a slower conection. Running out of system resources can cause your computer to freeze as well. Memory for a 3yr old system isn't very expensive and is really easy to install. Don't pay a shop  $80 or more to do it for you. Just look for info on the web on how to install it. It takes less than a minute and you will notice a great improvement in speed. You can spend that $80 on the hobby Also, if you want to avoid all of the system updates which could take a really long time to download and install, and just get the IE upgrade to see if it fixes your problem, got to http://www.microsoft.com/ie/ and just get the latest browser. Hope this helps.