Windows 7 still needs drivers. It is one of the things I have found most often wrong with most computers, I see today. Most people are letting the default drivers run, which work, but do not allow all the features of the hardware to be used. In some cases there are stability issues until the motherboard drivers are installed.
I just built a new system will all the latest hardware and had to install all the drivers (video, motherboard, sound, and even the Intel Ethernet controller), just like I would for XP. I found it odd that Windows 7 w/SP1 still needed over 100 updates. Seems to be too many for such a new OS.