Vista Booting Issue

I have a Toshiba Satellite A215 laptop running on Windows Vista Home Premium 32 bit(OS came with com), 1.00 GB ram, and the computer is about two years old. I am experienced with computers but I admit that I'm still not that saavy with Vista. For a while now, I've been having trouble with it freezing on the log-in screen but after a hard reboot, it would work. I know it's harsh on the computer but I didn't have any other choice. Just recently, it began to hang on the welcome screen and it boots incredibly slow. By the time it gets to the log-in screen it completely freezes.
Fortunately, It works in safe-mode (am using it now actually) so that helps narrow it down to the problem. I've tried running the startup repairs, system restore and even tweaked with some of the boot settings (in "msconfig"= of course with the advice of others)
The last thing it did when it ran normal was download an update from the microsoft site. I havn't installed any new programs recently and I actually cleaned out many of them that I don't use to save space. (ones that are not essential to the computer) I just really hope it isn't a virus.

As you can get into Safe Mode, try the "Last Known Good Configuration" option.

If you think it may be something nasty, you can d/l this on a working machine, burn to cd using an isoburner( do not format the cd , if Autoplay pops up, just close it ).

Dr.Web LiveCD is a software product that features a standard, Dr.Web scanner

View attachment boot-cd-iso.zip

Then boot from the cd on your ailing machine.

Hope it helps.

I must say, SIW2, you are a freaking god and I thank you so much for your help.
Unfortunately, the issue has not been resolved yet. I attempted to use the Dr. Web Live CD, which is pretty awesome for something that is free, but it wont update or connect to the network. Thus making the virus scan useless. I think the problem with it is the time is off (not in sync with my system) and I can't figure out how to properly set it (can that be done on a live CD?). I've been looking around the web to see if anyone else has had this problem and so far I've got nothing.
It's a vicious circle it seems... One thing leads to another. Any other ideas?