Symbols

I just imported a graphic from illustrator which i have put inside a movieclip, i need the movieclip to do a zoom, so I feel keeping it in a vector format is better.

The illustrator has filled up my library with thousands+ of symbols now, and stuff is getting a bit jerky. Should I break apart these symbols within the movieclip to just flat graphics - is that going to give me any increase in performance, or will it do ... nothing??

Yeah it will help performance,
Look for shapes that look far to complex.
for example if a circle is made up of multiple objects redraw this in flash.

If a gradient has been important as multiple layed objects break them or redo in flash.

Thats what I do anyway... and it helps.