Vista Tutorial - Directshow causes complete system freeze

Just did a clean install of Windows Vista Ultimate x64 on my system.
Everything works great until I try to play video files. If I view a video in
WMP 11, Winamp, or any other Directshow based player, I get a complete system
freeze. The video will typically play for a little bit, then the system
completely freezes (no blue screen, crash report, or error in the system log)
.. I cannot trigger the crash with any particular video file, so I don't
think it's a codec issue. I have noticed that about 7 out of 10 times I can
trigger the freeze by entering or exiting full screen mode. However, the I
can't seem to consistently re-create the freeze. For example, playing video
"a" may cause a freeze on open with the first attempt, while entering/leaving
full screen on the second attempt, and 3 minuets into the video it on the
third attempt.

I installed VLC player, and all video files work fine with it. Knowing that
VLC media player is not Directshow based, I'm lead to believe that the
problem lies with Direct show. Running DXDIAG comes up with no errors other
than my audio driver not being WHQL ceertified.

I'm kind of new to this kind of troubleshooting (i'm more experienced with
malware recovery), and I'm not exactly sure where to go from here. Any links
to sites with more information regarding troubleshooting complete freezes
like this would be highly appreciated. Is there some sort of program I can
run that will log everything that goes on in the system up till the point it
freezes? Is there some sort of way to re-install Directshow / DirectX ?

Thanks alot for reading, and thanks in advance for any help!!

System info:

AMD Athalon 64 x2 4800+
2047 MB RAM
Nvidia GeForce 7800 GS
MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum M/B (nforce 3 ultra chipset)
Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate x64 w/ all updates installed

Those are symptoms of a hardware or driver failure, as it looks like you're
guessing.

Reinstalling DirectX or DirectShow shouldn't touch the driver - focus on
that first.

--
Speaking for myself only.
See http://zachd.com/pss/pss.html for some helpful WMP info.
This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.
--

"Paul" <Paul@xxxxxx> wrote in message
news:A125A2DF-9748-4F15-9B1E-2570B384BFA4@xxxxxx