
Originally Posted by
oj88
The performance issues you're having has probably little to do with malware. Windows, over time, gets 'dirty'. In this state, services slows down, affecting network performance (among others). Rebooting in safe mode just makes Windows run in a skeletal state in which non-essential services and processes are skipped. Reinstalling Windows every year (in my case) proves to be a necessity to maintain acceptable performance. This is particularly true with Windows Vista and lower versions.
With Windows 7, it seems to retain its original performance state longer. My main PC has been on the same installation of Win7 for over 18 months with little perceivable performance loss.