My taskbar remains frozen for a long time (15 minutes or so) after the
computer starts up. During this time I can click on anything on desktop, run
it, etc. Except the network connections, they too would also not load until
the taskbar loaded. On other sites I've found other users having problems
with wireless cards and windows xp (I noticed my computer started doing this
after an xp update a while back, and wondered myself if it caused some sort
of driver conflict.) I downloaded the newest drivers for my wireless card and
on reboot following that the wireless utility that came with the driver would
launch but then also give an hourglass when the mouse was over top it.

Don't bother with suggesting system restore, I don't know how long ago this
problem started and I doubt I have saves that old.