Im not sure 3 minutes is overly long to be honest. Yes defragment the hard drive, this can be done using a utility in windows. Yes run wondows defender or similar to see if spyware is slowing it down.
You might also run a windows utility via the "run" box ..
typw "msconfig" and see what programs are loading when you turn the machine on. Sometimes programs run "other" programs that stay running eating up memory and cpu time.
Mart
July 2007