PC help

I'm not much of a PC guy and am having problems with our home PC. It's running terribly slow and I'm getting secondary IE windows popping up, despite running a pop up blocker.

Can anyone recommend a good diagnostic/anti-spyware program that I could run, at least to start with?

Thanks!

You might try the free product called Spybot to clean up the situation.
http://www.safer-networking.org/index2.html

I too am not that technical but I use Avast Free for Virus protection. http://www.avast.com/index
It really is free and really works. You do have to sign up and once a year they will try to get you to upgrade to the $ version but you do not have to and it still continues to be free. In no way are they annoying and they do not badger you to switch to $ version.
Along with Foxfire browser, I have been trouble free for a year now with this netbook on Win XP.

I recommend the following

1. Combofix http://www.combofix.org/download.php
2. Then dl/install/update/run Malwarebytes http://www.malwarebytes.org/mbam.php
3. Avg Antivirus. I run the corp version for my office of 275 employees. home ver: http://free.avg.com

this will clear 99.99 percent of malware/virus ridden machines.

1. Cleanup! (removes ALL temp internet files/ temp files etc) http://www.stevengould.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=28&Itemid=70

2. DEFRAG, DEFRAG, DEFRAG.. Defraggler will do this automatically better than the windows utility. http://www.piriform.com/defraggler

3. Got $50 bucks? Add RAM. you can never have enough. 32bit ver of windows supports 4GB.

Other things more time consuming.

A) Back up ALL important files to a USB HDD and format/Reinstall your computer. I recommend this once a year. Use Clonezilla.org to create disk images to speed up the process. Hell, use clonezilla monthly to create backups

B) HDD's do wear out. New ones are fairly inexpensive and will give you a faster data transfer rate.

Piriform's CCleaner is also a good product.

Get rid of IE. Well, actually you can't get rid of it, but stop using it. Use Chrome, or Firefox, or Opera. No internet explorer.

Another vote for running Spybot S&D, that one is usually pretty good at getting rid of, well, spyware.

Awesome. Thanks very much guys! I'm going to get to work!

Use Firefox with the AdBlock and NoScript extensions and pay attention to what scripts are running on through your browser.

Set fire to it, computers are teh devils

I swear by spybot.. great little program

malwarebytes is stellar. Used with Spybot and AVG Free I have been able to clean almost everything. These are the programs we used doing computer support.

Another thing I like to suggest to people is actively seek out updates from the Windows Update website.

agreed with most of what's been said already.

spybot search and destroy lavasoft adaware malwarebytes (mbam) and tweaknow regcleaner

throw a free antivirus and firewall on and keep it updated.