FCE4 cart before the Macbook horse

Question

I checked the system requirements to use FCE4, and my macbook meets them. However, it's like the old days of dial-up whenever I want to do anything, including and especially trying to watch raw footage in the viewer. In addition, I get the color wheel for a matter of seconds every time I touch pointer to any function, even if I start the computer fresh and don't open any other program. Also, it asks me to render everything (even without any effects added) to watch anything in the timeline, meaning that RT is non-existent. My most recent rendering of approximately 13 seconds of footage and one track of audio took an hour and a half.
At first, I thought it could be my trying to edit from footage on my external firewire LaCie. I brought the footage onto the computer with the program and met the same results.
Does my computer simply not have the chutzpah? Would an iMac be capable of handling it? Is it a laptop issue I'm having? Am I trying to build a house with tools made by Fisher Price? What's the best computing setup for optimal speed and cost effectiveness?
I have a JVC HD7U, and I love the quality of the camera. I convert the .TOD files using iSquint, and I get great looking mp4 files in 1280x800 res that FCE4 recognizes. I simply can't edit quickly (or, at all most of the time) with them.
I'm in the beginning stages of a film project that I'm really proud of, and this is a huge snag in the works. I'm indebted for any help you can offer.
Peaces,
Dan

Answer 1

Understood on the res issue. I've converted them using both iSquint and Streamclip. The former gives me good conversion, but FCE still runs slowly. The latter doesn't convert my .TOD files despite a manual claiming that it does.
How do I ensure that my footage is aligned with AIC? iSquint doesn't seem to give me the option of checking on it (it's a rather stripped down program), and Streamclip will only let me convert files after I've converted them with iSquint.
What do I need to set my Easy Setup to do? After my conversions, the sequence specs were closely matching my footage specs, but I couldn't get them exact. What's the most important part in setup? Footage framing? Also, the sequence was giving me 1440x1080 as its base when I reorganized it. Thank you for your time and expertise. I appreciate any help you can offer.
Peaces,
Dan