Slow boot, and shutdown

[Blackmoore]

One of my old systems that I use occasionally takes for ever to boot and shut down, sometimes 1-3 Minutes to boot, and 5+ to shutdown.

AMD XP 2600+
Abit NF7-S Mobo
GeForce 4 MX400 64MB
Segate 60GB HD
1GB PC2700 DDR

Everything else runs totally fine from what I have seen. Is this a sign of a dying or bogged down hard drive? Because when I used to use the system as my main system I don't ever remember it taking so long to boot and shutdown. I don't use the system for anything other than getting on the net or writing a paper. And its loaded with Spyware, Virus, and Firewall Protection. Even though protection like that won't keep everything out, it should keep enough off that it shouldn't slow the system down like this. Any Ideas?

 

[Apokalipse]

what have you done so far?
defrag, remove temporary files, make sure your hard drive is using an 80 wire IDE cable and not a 40 wire.
also make sure DMA is enabled

your sig is too big BTW, max is 8 lines normal size, 15 lines size 1 text

 

[sPlAtOiD]

I find that a reformat and reinstall every so often does wonders for the computer it will help with such problems.That is if you dont have hardware issues which you probley dont and if you dont mind starting over.I like to do it with my computers probably more often that most people but im a geek.

 

[Blackmoore]

I have completely reformatted the system in the past, and it makes it a bit faster, but nothing really too impressive. Ill have to check the cable to the Hard Drive. The family member who uses the system when im not, is really anal about temporary internet files, and removes them nearly every day, but ill check on that.