Windows 7: I can't stand this any more, please help!!

I know it is difficult to remedy my issue with basic information, so here is a quick run down on my situation:

My computer specs are listed in my profile.

I recently upgraded to Windows 7 with a clean install. There are times when my laptop is choppy, very slow. I scroll down, and it skips and takes forever. Then there are times when it runs nice and smooth. Why is that?

Every time I run task manager to see what is running, most of the time the resource hogging up is either IE or Firefox.



Please, I need some pointers on how to get this thing running smooth, all the time.

Thanks

From your specs you should not be having any issues running Windows 7 on your hardware.
The next time that you have the issue If you can take a snip of the Task manager, showing as much detail as you can, (show processes from all users), and upload it here by use of the paperclip icon.

This should allow us to diagnose better where the bottleneck is

It's running a little choppy now, so here is a quick snapshot:

What anti-virus are you using?

Well there does not seem anything out of place there that is stressing the cpu more than I would expect.

On initial install it is normal for the system to perform various housekeeping tasks such as indexing and setting the superfetch cache, although this is not showing here.

I assume that you have the latest drivers installed for all your hardware - you may want to check with the laptop's download site to ensure that there are no new drivers for your model as there is a lot of activity with drivers since the official release, with changes happening daily.

The other thing to try is to leave the laptop switched on for an hour or two when not being used to allow the OS to fully complete the initial setups - these may not show when you check as they are designed to stop when they detect user activity

Actually, since this was a new install, I didn't install an AV, yet. But, I usually use Avast.

I didn't know that Windows uses inactivity to complete/repair operating systems. That's news to me. So, can I place the unit in sleep/hibernate mode for it to complete the setups?

As for the driver updates, I used Windows update to install my drivers, so I have to assume they are updated. I went to ATI website, and what I have installed is the latest.

I doubt it is one of your browsers. They are using more RAM than that on my machine right now.

How recent was this install? You don't have antivirus protection installed yet?

The system has to be active for the setups to happen rather than in sleep or hibernate. I normally switch off the sleep function on any new install, switch off the monitor, and allow the system to run overnight.

The other question I would ask is does the issue only occur after sleep or hibernate - if so you may need to check the system drivers as this is a common issue with new installs.

generally with drivers I would check with the system manufacturer's website - Dell is normally very good in this respect - the actual manufacturer will often have newer drivers available than windows update

I installed Windows 7 just last week, then I reinstalled it again because it was so choppy. But now, as I type this message, my computer is flying great. It has its moments. One minute it is running awesome, like right now, and another minute it bogs down. Argh.