I think your problem is KDE specific. It's by far the most bloated of
the desktops.
Lee
Maybe kde from the early 90's.... last time i compared gnome vs kde i
found kde to be a lot lighter. I guess it depends what web browser you
run though. I run konq which adds very little overhead, if i run gnome
and moz, galleon or firefox it's heavier, and crapper for me. ;-)