I had a big problem with vista also. I don’t know any fancy lingo so this is what I did and it is eally fast now.
I was told that I had to increase my RAM. You should probably call a technition and he will tell you what to check. I think I had 512 MB and had to upgrade to 1 GB. I think it cost me about 90-$100. I’m not sure if this is what you need, but maybe.