I am assuming the paths to Gimp C:\Program Files\..... are just a typo.
screenshots: https://imgur.com/NTEnR3P.jpg
(1) This showing in Win10 Gimp 2.10.10 that icon folder you referred to
(2) There are two sets of folders, the C:\Users.... is your Gimp profile where your resources brushes - fonts - scripts - plugins ... are placed by you. Initially empty folders The C:\Program Files\GIMP 2\... is write protected from within Gimp (but you can still mess it up with an external file manager) The usual advice is leave it alone.
The slow opening of preferences is a mystery to me, The first time I have heard that problem. Fortunately, once set up no need to visit there very often.
screenshots: https://imgur.com/8yQdDc0.jpg
You could try opening Gimp from a 'CMD' terminal with the --verbose switch. (3) That gets an error terminal. Open preferences and see if the two lines (4) start straight away or are delayed. Not sure what that will prove
As a extremely-long shot and for no real reason, try turning off OpenCLEdit -> Preferences -> System Resources -> Hardware Acceleration and untick Use OpenCL
Otherwise, could be your AV but unlikely. Hopefully better advice will follow.
screenshots: https://imgur.com/NTEnR3P.jpg
(1) This showing in Win10 Gimp 2.10.10 that icon folder you referred to
(2) There are two sets of folders, the C:\Users.... is your Gimp profile where your resources brushes - fonts - scripts - plugins ... are placed by you. Initially empty folders The C:\Program Files\GIMP 2\... is write protected from within Gimp (but you can still mess it up with an external file manager) The usual advice is leave it alone.
The slow opening of preferences is a mystery to me, The first time I have heard that problem. Fortunately, once set up no need to visit there very often.
screenshots: https://imgur.com/8yQdDc0.jpg
You could try opening Gimp from a 'CMD' terminal with the --verbose switch. (3) That gets an error terminal. Open preferences and see if the two lines (4) start straight away or are delayed. Not sure what that will prove
As a extremely-long shot and for no real reason, try turning off OpenCLEdit -> Preferences -> System Resources -> Hardware Acceleration and untick Use OpenCL
Otherwise, could be your AV but unlikely. Hopefully better advice will follow.