My computer freezes :(

[JerryBoyZ]

Hi all!
Santa brought me a new machine, but.....

I'm having problem like this:
Everything seems to be working just Ok, but there is something wrong with my soundcard (SB digital 4.1) , at least I think so...: Sometimes when the sound/music/etc. is going to end, the whole machine freezes for about 1/2-1 seconds.
I have upgraded driver for that SB, even disabled it and used motherboards own soundsystem. Same kind of problem appears when playing DVD-movies: The film hangs for about 1/2 seconds and then jumps.
DMAs are in use, there is no conflicts with IRQs....
I'm not a guru with these kind of problems, but it would be nice to get this problem solved before I will contact the shop that sold that machine....

Some facts:
OS:Windows 2000 Professional (With service pack 3)
Motherboard: MSI745
Processor:AMD XP1700+
Memory:512Mb DDR333
Videocard:ATI Radeon 7500 DDR 64Mb
Soundcard:Sound Blaster 4.1 Digital

[ski]

See if the onboard sound adapter can be disabled either in BIOS or with a MB jumper.
If it cannot, then uninstall the SB software, remove the SB card from Device Manager, shut down, remove the SB card from the MB, restart, and enable the onboard sound adapter.

If the problem is still there, then remove one stick of RAM(assuming that at least 2 sticks are installed. I've heard of problems happening with 512MB of DDR333 installed.).
If that works, and you need 512MB, then go back to the supplier and swap the DDR333 for an equal amount of slower RAM.

[BigBlue66]

Have you checked for IRQ conflicts?

Have you tried reducing hardware acceleration? Sometimes DVD players respond better when DMA is disabled.

[JerryBoyZ]

Well, I have tried onboard soundsystem with and without SB, there is no conflicts with IRQs, tried different hardware acceleration types etc.... One thing that I have not tried is what ski told me to do with memory: I have 1 stick of that 512 Mb DDR memory and I haven't been able to try different kind of memory configurations. I think I'll contact the vendor today, I still got the warranty for that machine...

*** Thanks to all of you ***