I noticed this too. If I run Speedtest.net from a Win7 laptop running Mcafee, I get 25Mb/sec download, but on my Win XP SP3 desktop, I get 14Mb/sec. If I disable Web Shield, it's back up to 25Mb/sec. Maybe I always had this issue and never knew it when I had DSL @ 1.5Mb/sec, but became aware of it when I just upgraded my broadband to Comcast 25Mb service. Other than disabling Web Shield, or using something other than Avast, is there something I can do to fix this?