Now i am confused HELP stopping any programs from starting up is only to improve the actual bootup time, it has completely nothing to do with using bandwidth[ power of internet connection]
its normaly done by press start/ click run/ type " msconfig ", click the startup tab and there you have it.

If you decide to use that program be very carefull which programs you uncheck in the little box, you must leave your security running and if you don't understand what anything is, don't touch it, its best left alone, and normally used only by experienced hands.

A lot of people seem to have lots of icons [screen candy] they call it, all over their desktop, they don't realize that it uses up precious bandwidth, it actually slows your internet down, 2 or 3 ok but some people go mad with them and wonder why their net is slow.

A real noticable slowing down of the net is normally a trojan, virus etc, but running those 3 i mentioned will do the trick, a good fire wall like Zone alarm its free, and very good, i would download spyblaster as well which is another freebie and does a great job of stopping stuff getting into your works, run your antivirus programs [ like Adaware/spybot, AVG] regularly twice a week, use systems tools like defrag and error checking every few weeks , run an online anti virus like trendmicro once a week and you should be right.
I would class a person that only gets on the net for an hour or so after work every now and again,and probably connected up with that awfull dialup , a light user, anything above that using broadband downloading megabytes is not usaly classed as a light user, just ask your provider for a light internet users deal, i don't think you will be getting 3 or 4 hours a day of broadband.
Maintaince is the key to smooth running PC's.