Delay with IE links.

[trueman]

I seem to be having a bit of a delay when clicking onto a link within IE. If I right click to open a link in a new window or even left click to go straight to the link in the same window, there is a delay of about 6 seconds before anything will happen. There is no hard drive activity just the computer seems to lock up for 6 seconds, then I hear the click sound and then the linked page starts to open up. I also have Mozilla Firebird and have noticed that it doesnt happen when using Mozilla.
I hae XP with a P4 1.4ghz and 256mbRAM. It has only started doing this recently and I havent really instaled any progs lately that could cause this problem.
Any ideas????

[trueman]

Just to add I have noticed that my system has created a system restore point everyday since the 28th October and also skipped the 10th November for some reason. Why would this be happening and does it have anything to do with my above problem?