the thing isi've never experienced this problem on my own computer. the difference is only probably that I update windows and norton antivirus, plus sometime do a around of spyware scan. those things are pretty normal... having said that, I've seen such problems on other computer. the funny thing is mouse action are still very responsive, you can click-and-drag, you can do a lot of double-clicking. and anything you run in command prompt are ok too. apparently, there does not seem to be any deadlock or livelock at all.