Sound Blaster Live Value generates a squeal and locks up for no apparent reason...why?

I built this system 2 years ago. I am planning on giving this old one
to my parents since I built a new system recently. Anyways, the old
system has 2 sticks of Crucial PC100 SDRAM: one stick is 512MB SDRAM
PC100, 168-pin DIMM and the other is 256MB SDRAM PC100, 168-pin DIMM.
The old system will lock up for no apparent reason. This problem
occurs when I play any kind of sound (like streaming radio) while I'm
browsing, playing games, running any MSOffice program, etc

The system's FSB is running @ 133MHz (the ram is pc100), could that be
causing the squeal of death and subsequent lock up of the system?

 

Sounds like the sound card went south. Try a different one. When did
the problem start? What if anything was done to the system before the
problem started? Has the memory config been the same from day 1? To
check for a bad cell in the memory range used by the sound card, well
forget that, just download a free memory tester (check google) and let
it run all night. Make sure you get a program that will test all 700+
megs of memory - some of the free ones will stop at a certain point.

Does anything happen when the computer makes its beeps? Or when
windows makes its various chimes and chords? but most important -
when did it start happening and did anything change just before that?

to answer your last question - it should _not_ be the problem, but in
certain cases it _could_ be the problem . But you said the machine
was 2 yrs. old. Has the memory always been PC 100 with the bus always
running at 133? If both have always been the case, and this problem
just started recently, the answer is .........

good luck!
MF