KDE-Forum.org

Hello, this is my first post, so please let me know if you need more
information.

I'm running Debian Etch (4.0) on a PIII 1GHz w/ 256MB RAM and I have
recently switched to using KDE (version 3.5.5) for my desktop (from
Gnome, which worked fine). I mainly want to use KDE because I can get
Amarok running fine from there. However, it is taking me FOREVER to load
up KDE, on the order of 10 minutes. I went and ate breakfast once, came
back and it still hadn't loaded, not kidding. Once KDE is up, it's
running quite well (though using all but 7MB of my RAM).

I have read extensively (4 hrs of googling) about various startup
problems, and the main culprit seems to be networking difficulties (some
DNS lookups timing out). I run an iptables firewall on this system and I
have a two-computer LAN (just using a crossover cable). I run Samba (the
other box is WinXP) and I have a crappy little USB ADSL modem (the
Speedtouch 330), which took some work to set up. I've done most of this
manually, so I certainly could have messed something up. This is my
first Linux box, so I'm quite a newbie.

Any help you can provide would be really appreciated. I.e., is there a log file I can look at which might be enlightening? Do I need to reinstall KDE entirely? This is driving me
nuts! Thanks in advance.