[guitardom]

There is an entire set of bios tweaks on the first page of the i7 thread that are vital. I would doubt the mb is the problem, the gigabytes have been very tried and true around here. Getting your system dialed in takes a bit and some patience.

Another thing, a 1gb vid card on a 32 bit os w pro tools is huge!! It is pulling some serious ram away from you for use in your system. A 512 max is recomended and a 256 is really the way to go!! Nvidias have generally been steered away from as well. They have been known to be trouble makers from time to time.

Uninstalling and reinstalling pt is sometimes necessary making sure to wipe all traces of it. Sometimes the same w the os has been necessary. Sometimes defragging the c drive can streamline the system a bit as well. Unplugging all other drives but your os and recording drive is recomended to troubleshoot. Do not install the supplied easytune software that came w the mb!!!! Huge issues arise from it, that actually match your problems I believe...