IWeb compatibility with IE8/Firefox

Question

Hi all, first time posting...just found out about these forums recently & they have been helpful already so I am hoping some of you can shed some light on a technical issue I am having. Just launched my site recently & have been having issues with getting the domain to transfer, I think we've got that licked almost. My actual question is this....
My site which is very content heavy (fire apparatus photos, 100 pages currently with more planned) is very slow when viewing it on my PC laptop (about 2 yrs. old, fast processor with Vista...ughhh & a broadband connection). Some of the links on certain pages do not work at all (most do but there are about 10-15 pages where they don't). Per my 1-to-1 trainer's advice, I updated to IE8 & the latest version of Firefox to see if this helped but still no luck. Another trainer told me that due to compatibility issues, this may not be "fixable". With all the technology out there, despite the differing operating systems with PC & MAC, I can't believe there's no way to fix this issue. 99% percent of the folks visiting this site will be PC users & I don't think many will be thrilled about having to download another browser to view it.
Anyone have a clue how to remedy this? And no, I cannot reduce the amount of pics on the pages.
Sorry for the long explanation, hope someone here can provide some helpful input. Thanks in advance, Tom

Answer 1

1 - I use Web Site Maestro to optimize and upload my sites. It can reduce a site's size by up to nearly 47%. Image files can be compressed to a size you can set. I use a Quality Index (in WSM) of 69%. I've compressed image files with another application to a 41% level with good results for my needs. You can experiment with the settings to the the smallest size that's acceptable for you. PNG files without masks or transparent backgrounds are also optimized by converting to jpgs and optimizing.
2 - computers that don't have that font will substitute one that will probably not fit your design and cause it to look poorly designed.
3 - You might consider breaking down your site into multiple sites with fewer pages. That will allow you to upload fewer pages when changes are made. You can link to the other pages from a master site in a number of ways and then back to the master site.
If you go the multiple site route you could create separate domain files to manage the separate sites. Fewer pages to load in iWeb, etc. I use iWebSites to manage over 75 individual sites. It lets me create multiple sites and multiple domain files.
If you have multiple sites in one domain file here's the workflow I used to split them into individual site files with iWebSites. Be sure to make a backup copy of your original Domain.sites files before starting the splitting process and move it to another location on your HD until you're satisfied the separation process is completed and what you want.
This lets me edit several sites and only republish the one I want.
Study your options and choose the one you're most comfortable with.