Win 7 64 bit Hard-Locks constantly

Good Morning, sorry in advance for the long post. I recently did a clean install of Windows 64 bit (build 7100, no dual boot, wiped the HD clean) on the following system:

Intel Quad Core Q6600 @ 2.4 GHz
4 GB Ram (2 x 2GB)
300 GB SATA HD
Abit IP350 Pro Mobo
(integrated Realtek RTL8169 PCI Ethernet)
(integrated audio)
EVGA NVidia Ge-Force 9800 GTX+
550W BFG Powersupply

Windows 7 automatically detected all drivers for the system, device manager showed no problems and I was able to start customizing the UI and browsing the internet but after ~10 minutes the system froze (a complete hard-lock requiring me to manually hit the restart switch).

The system froze in a similar manner after 5-25 min of use several more times and I started to investigate the problem. After discovering the system will not freeze in safe mode (but did freeze in safe mode with networking after ~30 min) I thought it might be something with the LAN drivers. I restarted into normal mode, disabled the LAN devices and uninstalled the drivers. System still froze after a few minutes. Assume this disqualifies many driver problems.

Only thing I can think of (besides a driver problem) is that this problem is associated with overheating. However, the PS does not seem to be pushing out any noticeably hot air and the CPU and GPU fans seem to be working properly. I have been running this system with Win XP (32 bit) for the past few years and had no issues with overheating during gaming, etc. System was often on for a week+ at a time.

Any ideas? If I reinstall a fresh copy with Win 7 32 bit do you think I'll see these same issues?

One final note--I did setup a 60GB partition on the HD where Win 7 was installed and left the remainder as a Data drive. Is anyone seeing problems when you set up custom partitions?

Thanks in advance for the help.

Thanks Gary. Is there any reason to expect that my hardware would run significantly hotter with Win 7 compared to XP? I know the jump up to 64 bit probably puts more demands on the system but from what I can tell my hardware should be able to handle this OS. If worse comes to worse I'll try a clean install, I did burn disks of 32 bit and 64 bit windows so hopefully I can get one of them working.

Wish I located my XP CD before I started this project :/ Was planning on using the RC version until the retail Windows 7 was available. I heard such great things!

Am downloading the Temp monitor software and will let you know what I find.

Hesitate to say I've fixed the problem but my system has been running without issue for ~2 hrs now. A quick summary of what I did:

Installed temperature monitors for my major system components and quickly disqualified this as the cause of my problems. CPU was running ~32 deg C, other components were low as well. At this point I was convinced that the problem had to be a driver issue.

Went back to the device manager and started rechecking each component one-by-one by disabling drivers and waiting for the system hard lock. Eventually got back to the Network adaptors and realized that I hadnt checked my wireless PCI adaptor when I had been looking at the driver issue earlier. I hadn't been connected to a wireless adaptor and was not using this device, but after disabling the driver and restarting the system has been functioning perfectly.

For reference, this is a NetGear WPN311 RangeMax Wireless PCI Adapter, driver version 2.0.0.70 from Microsoft (dated 3/11/09). Not sure if this driver was at fault or if it was some conflict with one of my other system drivers (perhaps the wireless driver was creating a conflict with my Realtek Ethernet driver).

A little disappointed that I wont be able to use the wireless card with the desktop but I'll manage to work my way around the problem--just glad to have a stable system again. Hope this response helps someone else out--I'll check back in case anyone has a follow up question.

An added note:

I went into the Windows Event Log to see if I could identify any common errors, and saw a boatload of Event ID 7001:

"The Computer Browser service depends on the Server service which failed to start because of the following error:
The dependency service or group failed to start."

Know this event ID is associated with network settings which seems to confirm this fix.