Incompatible hardware or just OS?

[Octomail]

I don't have an 8-core, 12GB RAM, water-cooled laptop like everyone else seems to, but I've cleaned and optimized two dual-core laptops identically (defrag, full scan and clean, disabled Windows wanting to run everything at startup, set high performance, appearance for best, ReadyBoost - everything), but the older, slower Toshiba now starts instantly after bootup and runs fast, where my HP-Compaq sits on the welcome screen for 18 seconds and is slow in general. I'm thinking the 2.1 Ghz 2GB RAM Hitachi architecture on the HP is just no good at running Windows 7 64-bit, where the Toshiba - half the RAM and slower CPU - running Vista (appearance supposed to hit the processor too hard) works like a dream. Am I right about the motherboard being a mismatch for the (preinstalled) OS, is 7 'just like that', or have I missed something else (and no, I haven't uninstalled anything I didn't add)?

[Computer_Commando]

Without knowing the exact specifications of each machine, we can offer no recommendations.

[Geek-9pm]

I don't have an 8-core, 12GB RAM, water-cooled laptop like everyone else

Well, in that case, there are only a few here in your category. 

[Shark Fin 101]

18 seconds

Oh my. Hope you don't die of old age.

*sarcasm* 

On a more serious note, is the OS freshly installed on both? If the older laptop is a fresh (or fresher) install of Windows, that could explain the disparity. And yes, I/we will probably need system specs to offer any sort of diagnosis.