win 7 search and file download not working

Ive been using win7 for about 6 months now. Before that I was using xp for 15 years.

Im having problems with:

1-Search; the status bar gets to 99% pretty fast, then it's literally hours before the search finishes. Why?

2-Ive been using firefox for over 10 years now. I always set it to download files to the desktop. However, win7 sometimes buries the downloaded file in different locations
as in C:\Users\paul\AppData\xxx Which I can find after hours of searching. Sometimes to a temp file, which is not available the next day. (I always wait at least 24 hours, then run a AV scan on all downloads). Other times its on my desktop, where it should be. Why?

3-Another issue of less importance is that i have taskbar autohide, just like when I used xp. I also usually leave one or more instances of win explorer open and system set to reopen them at boot. This worked great on xp, however, on win 7, the taskbar is displayed and each button for each instance of win exp flashes and taskbar will NOT auto hide until I click each button. That's an annoyance.

thanks for any help,
paul

Hi Paul

Well lookin at your Specs, (or lack of them)
First thing that comes to my attention is the lack of an AV, you could be infected.
lookin back at your earlier posts if the system cant see that other drive but its still there then search could be stuck in a loop.

As its a Dell DIY, i doubt it came with W7 so it could be continually searching for updates.
Are you on SP1?

Is taskbar autohide a 3rd party prog or are you using the personalise option.

Roy

No lack of AV.
Search does complete!
previous post unrelated. That was over a year ago. This is a newer computer.
This computer dell factory installed win7.
taskbar autohide has been included in MS O/S since xp.