Disable programs from 'starp-up'
There are two ways do disable programs that may be in your startup (like icq, messanger,) The easiest is to do the following:

start --> run --> msconfig
Click on the "startup" tab (furthest right)\
Unclick any items you don't want to load when windows starts.The second is by deleting registry entrys, this can be done the following way:
Start --> run --> regedit
Navigate to : HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\RunHKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
Delete any entry's that you don't want to load up