Lag and freeze up problem w/ Windows 7

I'll try to keep this brief.  Whenever I try to run more than 2 programs at once on my computer, the last program I open doesn't open, and the others become unresponsive.  When I try to reset, it stays on the shutting down screen for at least 5 min. if not 10.  The programs in question are Windows media player, IE8, and whatever poker client I happen to be on at the time (Full Tilt, Pokerstars, etc.)  I'm running Windows 7 Pro 64bit for my O/S.  I'd like some input as to where to start looking to fix this problem.  Thanks for your time!

What is your hardware? Can you give us a run down of it?

[Moderator]

Has this always happened or did it just start? If it just started, what is new since the last time it worked properly (new hw, sw, virus, error, etc)?

I have an HP A6412.  This problem started happening when I upgraded from Vista 32bit to 7 pro 64bit.  I also swapped HDD from the stock one to a WD Black 640GB HDD, and I swapped out a Wifi G PCI card and went to an N USB adapter.  I decided to do all this when 2 of my memory chips got fried and I replaced them w/ Patriot 2x2GB 240 pinn DDR2 modules.  I NEVER had this problem with my computer under my old O/S doing the same thing.  Thanks again for your time, everyone!

[Moderator]

So you upgraded the OS, moved from 32 bit to 64 bit, and changed most of the critical hardware. Did you not think that was important to mention?

Sorry about that.  I just thought that someone had encountered something similar w/ Windows 7 and could point me in the right direction to a solution.

[Moderator]

There is no such "common" problem with Windows 7. It is clearly related to something you've done - one of the changes.

In your opinion, should I be looking at hardware or software first? 

[Moderator]

In my opinion (and that's all it is - an opinion) you should start with hardware simply because of all the changes you made. But it's tough to do more than guess from this distance

I've been reading some of the other posts on this forum, and have noticed that some people are using IE8 32bit under a 64bit OS to avoid compatibility issues w/ flash player.  My lag problems usually start when I try to launch IE8.  Iwill  try this first when I get home to see what my result is before I start gutting my computer AGAIN!!!

[Moderator]

You can try Firefox too.

I get home from work in about an hour.  I will try Firefox and let you know what happens.  Should I be using a 32bit version of that as well?

[Moderator]

32 Bit. Firefox 64 bit has yet to be udated.

I tried to install firefox last night and the installer told me the files were corrupt.  I decided to go w/ IE8 32bit, and have not had another such incident since.  Hope it stays that way!!

[Moderator]

I tried to install firefox last night and the installer told me the files were corrupt.

This does not make sense...where in fact did you DLoad it from ? ?

I am running Win 7 (X64), been using Firefox (32) without issue and yes, I have to run IE8 (32) or the (64) crashes, highly unstable.

If you are getting corrupt downloads, "Fire fox" and browser crashes, I would make sure your nic is working. One major problem my son had was finding a nic to work well with Win 7 X64, we went through a few and finally managed a Dlink to work properly, others would not work, or crash the browser and give him 28k speeds on 2mb internet.