Fix osCommerce Slow Page Load in IE & Firefox

I need someone to fix osCommerce 2.2RC slow page load in IE and Firefox. On Jan. 12, 2012, I found the following message displayed on the site: > **2006 - MySQL server has gone away > > select banners_id, banners_title, banners_image, banners_html_text from banners where status = '1' and banners_group = '468x50'** > > > **[TEP STOP]** The issue was fixed but the site became ridiculously slow in loading on both Internet Explorer and Firefox. The site only loads in Safari and Chrome browsers. Requirement: Diagnose and fix the problem.