Alderon has a point there. If your HD shuts down after a half hour and your cpu goes to a lower access mode, that will kill it. Disable the power saver both in your BIOS and in windoze control panel. Better yet, make a profile in windoze called "render" and turn up the screws, then select that one. Also, consider other TSR's (systray programs, etc) and ditch them. Things like Norton auto update going off etc tend to blow the deal.