Windows 7: Gadgets Repeatedly become Unresponsive For Short Time

Ever since I bought my PC two years ago, I've had problems with the gadgets. They become unresponsive for two seconds, then responsive again for 2 seconds, then responsive again so on and so forth. It happens with the built in gadgets and third party also. It was never a problem until now. I bought a new case. Now, I set up this case so that when the disc drive is closed, you can't tell a drive is even in the bay. Which also means there's no button to open the drive. I set up a gadget that opens my drive when I click it. The only problem is that it's highly annoying trying to guess when the gadget is working and hitting it at the right time. Any idea what's causing this problem?