I used some dodgy RAM a few months ago - it was not static free. I've been getting weird USB errors from time to time, one of the dimm slots seem to have stopped working, and in a music program, the animations are not visible. Is my mobo screwed?

usually it wont do anything, but all those problems seem to lead to a corrupted copy of windows. maybe try a reformat?

Have you checked for hardware conflicts?

I've just reformatted and reinstalled everything - I'm a musician, and the meters stopped working one fine day. At the same time, I started getting directdraw errors, so I figured starting over again would be the best route to take. After reinstall, I tried installing the software in question in 3 scenarios: 1) without any Windows updates, 2) after all Windows updates, and 3) after installing only updates related to multimedia (I tried using Restore Points as well as another full format and reinstall of XP). In all the cases, the meters in the program would not work. I noticed in System Properties that it claimed I had 128mb, when I really have 384mb. I switched a 256mb dimm to another slot, and now I have 384mb again. My computer seems to run a little slow, and prior to the reinstall, I had to get a pci usb interface because I kept getting usb bandwidth errors when using my usb audio interface. Here's some more weirdness: go to djrx.com (a website of mine). The trails are very choppy on my home machine, perfectly fine on my PIII900 at work (the programs in question also work fine). The graphics card at work is an Nvidia Riva TNT2, at home it's a Matrox Millenium G200. I had some problems with the meters in Win2000, but I can't recall whether that was before or after the dodgy ram. Thanks for your input so far.