@Jorn:
those two both sound feasible given my situation. my computer has been moved so that our grandparents can have the spare room while they stay (they'll be here a few more weeks) and as of this move the power hasn't been sufficient for me to use more than a couple of USB devices (dodgy socket, i think).

also, my fan has been getting really loud lately. i thought of cleaning it, opened my computer, and saw that i had no idea how. but there isn't any correlation between the fan going crazy and the computer freezing, so maybe power is more of an issue.

@Quad: i have all the latest XP updates except a Microsoft Office Update seems to fail every time i try, but since i'm on holidays i don't need to use Office at all lately. my internal drive is old, small, and very nearly full, so i have to rely on the external hard-drive.

@Michael: where do i find SATA drivers? should i be looking for them based on my motherboard?

thanks so far guys. i've had no issues so far today, and i'll see what i can do to minimize power consumption from this particular socket. if it gets too bad i might reconfigure to just use one screen (using two atm) to reduce power consumption.

julz