Explorer.exe taking a long time after log in.

[kspanks04]

After logging in to XP the background image loads but nothing happens for about 20-30 seconds, then the explorer process starts and everything pops up just fine. I'm wondering if anyone knows what could be causing the delay? I've disabled all third-party apps from automatically starting up (except Norton). This delay only happens when the computer is first started, or restarted, it doesn't happen if I log off and log back on.

Thanks everyone!

EDIT: I should add that there is no delay when booting in safe mode.

 

[mhelm1]

Disconnect from the net and disable norton. reboot. what happens?

 

[kspanks04]

Still experienced a delay. I opened the task manager this time to monitor some of the processes. The system idle process was at 100% so it doesn't appear that anything is hogging resources. Also I noticed that explorer.exe was running, even though the desktop wasn't running. There were a few instances of Googleupdate and two instances of Norton's ccsvchst.exe. Is there a way to disable Norton completely, without uninstalling it? I just disabled the firewall and the antivirus part of it.

Thanks for the reply.

 

[mhelm1]

It could still be norton doing a start-up scan. Disable in the norton startup options and try again.
Also download ccleaner below and do a registry clean up:
http://www.piriform.com/ccleaner

 

[kspanks04]

SOLVED:

So I went in and disabled a lot of Windows services, including some of the new Windows Live services according to this guide: http://www.blackviper.com/WinXP/servicecfg.htm. I probably disabled or set to manual, 20 services. I can't say for sure which service was causing the delay but now it loads fine. Thanks for the suggestions.