Big Time Clean Install Problems with SXPS 13

Hey. First off, thanks for anyone who takes the time to help me, I greatly appreciate it.

I decided to try and do the whole clean install thing with my SXPS 13 today and - well, now I'm completely freaked out and regret it completely. I kind of wish I was warned it wouldn't be so simple for a newbie laptop user, because this has been the most computer-related stress I've had in my entire life. Now I feel like I've permanently wrecked my new $1500 laptop because I have no clue what to do about the huge mistake I've made.

First of all, it seems to me like my entire computer has slown down. I downloaded iTunes on the original install within a minute or two; now, it takes 15 minutes. Internet pages come up slower than before it seems to. (I had some issues at first installing the driver for the wireless thing)

I did put the Dell Driver disc in, of course; I was so freaked out I went through everything I could, extracted then installed, because I didn't know what was supposed to go on and what wasn't (it didn't let me download drivers for things I didn't have, of course).

When I first started it up, Windows new rating for my computer was 1.0. I made it do it again, and it went up (5.3), fortunately, but it can't help but make me think what else I might be missing.

Another red flag is that when I go back to the Dell Driver disc, and I try to install something to see if I already did it, it asks if I would like to "create" the file as nothing existed their before. As I was 90% sure I did install it once before, I tried it with one I new I installed. It went through as if I never installed it, so I'm afraid if every time I restart my computer isn't going to work unless I take the time to reinstall every driver.

There has to be something huge I'm missing here. If anyone can think of anything, please let me know. Also, please let me know if anyone knows of a guide to the clean install on this computer (I already looked at Microsoft's Vista Clean Install guide, obviously that doesn't fix all the Dell driver problems).

Thank you so much for your time.

EDIT

And... the bigger problem. When I first had it, sound played wonderfully. Now every few seconds I get a chain of static blips. Is that the latency spikes? Wasn't that supposed to go away with the clean install, not come with it? D= Any idea how to fix this?

EDIT 2:

And when the sound problems started, my computer slowed down considerably more, which has me totally panicking. I now wait for about 20 seconds for things to open that originally opened in 1.

 

Calm down

My guess would be that you gained back speed on your computer when you isntalled the chipset drivers.

Secondly, the missing files. It might be so that the directories are removed when the install is done, not completly sure on that tough.

Otherwise, you got the dell xps support with your 1340, use it, they are good and should be able to help you with reinstalling, or even returning it if you are still in time for that.

 

I don't see how I can return it... I made the problem by clean installing Vista, I believe.

But thanks for your help, I appreciate it.