After reading the legion & manifold comments in reply to my Apple Mac post, I upgraded the RAM on my PC from 512 thingy's to 2gb's worth of thingy's.
The difference is just incredible! Thanks for all the helpful replies.
I believe it was Dennis who first suggested it could be the RAM memory. I reacted to his advice badly due to previous differences of opinion. I was wrong to do so & I publicly apologise to Dennis.
Special thanks to John Rumm for his help off group.