Windows 10: UNWANTED SMALL BLANK WHITE POP UPS AND VERY SLOW OPENING OF SOFTWARE AND FILES

Hello!

I'm having trouble with little white windows continually popping upon my desktop at different times, slow boot-up, very slow opening of software and very slow opening of individual files. But first, details of my computer and operating system:-

COMPUTER:

Acer Aspire ES1-531-C6FQ
Mfg date: 2015/10/07
Serial no.: NXMZ8AA00154109E586600

OPERATING SYSTEM: Windows Product Key Information:
Product Name: Windows 10 Home
Version: 18362.1016 64-bit OS
Product ID: 00325-80260-02800-AAOEM
Installed Key: W8HWN-BWHXM-H9X2R-PQ6DH-2R393
OEM Key: W8HWN-BWHXM-H9X2R-PQ6DH-2R393
OEM Edition: Win 10 RTM Core OEMM


First of all, bootup is very slow with the "hourglass" icon displaying on the desktop continuously for about 90 sec., after the desktop first appears following startup of my computer.


Then after startup, multiple small while pop up screens appeared, accompanied by very slow opening about 2 mins. of a .png image file on the desktop, when opening it with MS Paint. An example of what was happening is shown in the screen shot below, captured in a .png file using the "print screen" command.





After that particular display appeared, many times a single small while pop up window would suddenly appear and then disappear after a fraction of a second.

Then I tried opening Google Chrome, and this took almost 1 min.

From reading elsewhere about problems comparable with the above, it appears that I might have a virus or malware problem.


What do you think could be causing this, and what should I do to fix it?


Robert T. Chisholm, Ottawa, Canada

*** Email address is removed for privacy ***

:)