computer crashing a LOT
 

My computer keeps crashing! It does it in both Windows and Linux. Can anyone tell me what pieces of hardware could be making this happen and maybe how I could diagnose them to figure out exactly which one I need to replace?

First of all, to get it to crash, all I need to do is switch workspaces... open Netbeans after it crashes once... open a folder... stuff like that. It doesn't crash the first time I do this stuff. It waits for an hour or so after I've been using the computer and goes nuts.

I can't even install Red Hat anymore, because the glibc won't install or it gets to about 60% and some other package crashes. Even Ghost was messing up ealier, but that seems to be working for me now.

I'm wondering if it has anything to do with heat. I have kept my computer on for days at a time in the past with no problem, but that was in Windows. Maybe I didn't have something configured right in Linux and I fried something?

Another thing I should mention is that a few days before this started happening, I removed my modem and put it back in... then I have to remove and install the video and audio cards too. The reason for that is my mainboard isn't seated perfectly into the computer and I have to lift it up a bit to make the cards seat into the slots tightly and screw them in. Maybe I lifted it up too hard? I'm very careful about that, but maybe this time I busted the mainboard. The board is functional, however.

I've had this computer for about 2 years now.

It could be any hardware part of your computer really. Try taking out everything but the gfx board, boot windows or linux and see if it still crashes. If it doesn't, add the next card, and do the same thing. Could be a good idea to test your memory too.