I've done it foreground and background and didn't see any difference in speed. any help you can give would be appreciated.

have you done any speed check on yours? I mean, if you get a result 10% or 30% different than mine, then who cares, but if you get FACTORS of difference, then it would point to something in my technique being more time-consuming that it needs to be, which I certainly hope it is since the current speed is horrible.

thanks for your time.