Apache2 "sleeps" for couple of seconds on Windows

Question

Hi guys,

I run an Apache2 server on my Windows XP Pro SP3 machine. The problem I am having is that it does not want to start loading php page for 2-3-4 seconds. I monitored the Task Manager and the httpd process is at 0% cpu activity for that time and then on starting to parse the page, it goes to 20-30-50%. The webserver should not be sleeping as this is happening in development, so I access its resources every other minute. It is even more weird to me that it does not do this always... and I cannot get a pattern.

The websites use MySql5, if this can help resolving the problem.

Any advice in helping me debug this issue is greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance!

-Tisho