Help me figure this out..

[slackerinabox]

I have a fairly recent, home made computer (specs to follow) and have noticed a very annoying problem with it... When using the computer programs often "stutter" and freeze.. I can move the mouse, etc but foreground windows (mostly IE, opera/etc.) turn all white and I can't do anything until the computer stops "stuttering"...It sometimes stutters for a good minute or two.. It doesn't crash - it just stutters and eventually everything works fine - nothing crashes, etc. etc... I have been able to have my task manager up during some of these "stutters" and I notice that both CPU and MEMORY resources are maxed out during the stutters.. I can't imagine what's causing this.. Any ideas? I reformatted and reinstalled windows and the problem is still around.. The only background processes are AIM and SOMETIMES norton antivirus (it's usually disabled).. Well, here are my specs:

-WinXP pro
-Geforce 3 TI 200 video card
-512 Mb generic pc3500 ram
-1x80gb samsung hd, 1x70gb seagate hd, 1x40gb WD hd (all 7200rpm - the samsung is on primary master and is my system drive)
-pioneer a04 dvd drive
-soundblaster audigy 1
-abit bh7 mother board
-p4 2.4b - NOT overclocked (i don't game.. I need stability not frame rates)
-ATX case with 400w power supply (from compgeeks - don't remember the exact brand)

**Software**
Only top shelf stuff mostly.. No shareware, no piracy, nothing beyond the norm.. That's why I'm pretty sure this is hardware and not software (if these software have issues then this problem would be a lot more common than it is).. Anyways, here's all that I use on my computer:
-Office XP (academic)
-Photoshop 7.0 (academic)
-AIM - newest version
-Outlook (both express and standard)
-Final Draft (screen writing software)
-Quicktime, winamp 2.91 and Windows Media player 9.0 - no real player
-Norton Antivirus..
-Nero demo - background "integration" disabled (no nero image driver, etc.)

All of my windows updates are recent and I'm only using the newest drivers on my system .. Sorry for the long post but does anyone have any ideas what's going on? Thanks so much!

 

[KGB]

During these "stuttering" episodes does anything get logged into your event log? (system or application)?

 

[slackerinabox]

Originally posted by: KGBMAN
During these "stuttering" episodes does anything get logged into your event log? (system or application)?

I never get the event log pop up ("WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEND INFO TO MICROSOFT") - is there somewhere else that I should be looking?

 

[jtecp]

goto start-settings-control panel-administrative tools-event viewer and see if you have any errors in there.

 

[elzmaddy]

Keep the task manager open on the processes tab and tell us what process or processes have abnormally high CPU usage during that stutter period. You may wish to click on the 'CPU' heading to sort processes by CPU usage.