My Safari suddenly became very slow to launch, and started giving beachballs a lot. The fix I finally found is easy--and several other people have said it works for them too:
Empty out the Icons folder in your user's Library/Safari folder.
Start Safari up and all should be well. No need to throw out prefs, Reset, repair permissions, or re-install Safari. I've heard some very painful fixes for this problem--and they usually include throwing out a lot more than necessary.
The culprit seems to be a bug regarding the favicons (the little icons on bookmarks). That Icons folder stores the favicons of the places you've visited. It can grow to several MB--but whether that's what triggers the bug I cannot say.
After doing this, your bookmarks will have generic icons. But don't worry, as you visit your bookmarks, each icon will return.
Hope this helps people! Some have told me it speeds up Safari even when they hadn't realized more speed was possible.
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