Windows 7 - Random Hard Crash when audio files are played

So, I built a new pc a week ago and have been having some technical issues with it. I am running windows 7 home premium (sp1) on an asus m5a99x mobo, which has the realtek alc-892 audio chip as its on-board sound.
Its pretty random when I get a crash, but it seems to only happens when I am playing audio, whether it be windows media player or a game or vlc. It is always a hard crash where I cant ctrl-alt-del and i dont get a BSOD. The audio will get distorted or turn off and the mouse and keyboard become unresponsive. As for the random part, sometimes i can get away with up to 6 hours of audio use before the crash; the music played overnight once, but sometimes its right when I go into a game or WMP.
The events viewer has no recollection of crash stats, so it just shows my hard reboot as a kernel power error 41. I have tried these things with no apparent change: updating BIOS, updating South Bridge, installing k-lite codec packs (both x86 and x64), uninstalling realtek to run windows audio only, updating realtek, using older drivers for realtek, reinstalling mobo cd, and a few more.
The funny thing is, if I dont use audio everything works fine. I disable realtek hd in devices and I can run it forever. Just no sound. I use my pc for recording in my studio and really want to get it up and running, so I can continue to make music. Thanks for the help!