Sidebar takes 10-30 secs to load

I’d probably blame the other sites that serve you the ads.

I don’t think so. I removed the poll, and the skyscraper ad as a test, still was slow.

It’s just the ads that load slow for me (the right-most sidebar content)

i have friends who have same ads, same host, same hosting plan even, who do not have their sidebars stall like mine. I really have to rule out the ads. I’m thinking it’s some error in the code on my site? Maybe I may have messed something up inadvertantly. Would anyone be able to verify this?

I see a problem with your code, 187 errors:
https://validator.w3.org/check?verbose=1&uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.hornyoyster.com%2F

Those errors are not the problem. I looked at many other sites, and most of them have hundreds of those types of “errors” and these are huge sites, that are running perfectly.

You came here asking for ideas. You disagree with each one you receive.

For me, with a clean browser cache, I see your entire page almost instantly. EXCEPT for that right column block with the “vizu” web poll and all the ads. It took over 25 seconds to show up. A glance at your source shows me that poll and the adbrite ads are both coming from other sites.

You don’t wanna hear it, fine. But those are your slowdowns.

cashbagg: You’re best thinking can’t solve the problem. Time to listen to someone else.

cashbagg: Just because other sites don’t validate doesn’t mean it’s acceptable.

Making your site valid is the first step towards resolving problems. Invalid sites frequently don’t work on alternative browsers. Sure, those “major” sites work fine in IE or maybe Firefox. But what about Opera? Safari? That browser on my PDA?

Validating your site is crucial to solving problems of any kind. Valid sites are faster and more compatible. Always make your site valid. Don’t look at what others do. Who says they’re the right people to learn from anyway?

Also, your sidebar is slow because of the ads. I see the exact same thing as Handy does.

Worth a read too:
https://diveintomark.org/archives/2003/05/05/why_we_wont_help_you

OK thx for replies, I will look into all your suggestions. One last thing.

What would you say to this:

Using IE, I’ve noticed if you type in my URL https://www.hornyoyster.com sidebar loads fast, but at bottom of screen….waaaaayyy down. Same thing goes if you refresh. Clicking hyperlinks to my site loads sidebar fine, and so does any viewing in Firefox. Any final thoughts?

On that, I’d wager you have an image just a bit too wide in one of the posts. IE’s a bit more finicky about that than FF.