Intel iMac, 21" screen, total fail

Question

I bought this mac after having serious problems with PC stability and constant crashes, and now I'm wishing I had stayed with with my Windows Box. It's that bad.
The machine itself is a intel based 21" iMac, 2 gigs ram, running osx10.5.6.
Most often used software includes:
world of warcraft
photoshop/illustrator/indesign (CS3)
itunes
nicecast
firefox
The problem is, it crashes (freezes, will not respond, requires a hard restart) multiple times every session, no matter what software I'm running. It is especially prone however to crashing during the following:
any WoW session
anytime I plug in an iPod (I have several, a 30gig classic, a 60 gig classic, a older nano, and a iTouch - all software for them as up-to-date as it can be.)
anytime I run videos (example: youtube) plus anything else
anytime I use iTunes for any significant period of time
I've cleaned & run "permission repairs" (a.k.a. apple's 'here do this, it does nothing but you'll feel useful' maintenance step) regularly.
I've deleted caches, and even gone so far as to reseat the ram (oftentimes after crashing from being connected to an iPod, it will restart to the multiple beep "bad ram" warning)
I'm quickly losing patience with what should be a relatively stable user experience, and am seriously considering junking the **** thing and going back to a PC. Please, keep me from falling back to the dark side, *what am I missing*???
Message was edited by: Damion MT

Answer 1

HI Damion,
If you could post {copy/paste} a crash log here that would be helpful. How to locate a crash log:
1. Open Finder.
2. Click "Go" in the menu, then select "Go to Folder".
3. Copy and paste this path into the Finder dialog:
~/Library/Logs/CrashReporter/
4. Click the Go button.
5. Finder opens the folder containing the crash log. Look for a the crash file with a date field that looks like the most recent.
Meantime, have you performed any maintenance on your iMac ever? If not, best to check the boot disk for errors?
If not, shut down the iMac. Now, press the power button, hold down the C key, and insert the restore disk all at the same time. Keep holding down the C key until you see the Apple logo. An Installer window will open but DO NOT proceed with any installations, instead from the Menu Bar, select Utilities/Disk Utility. In the DU window, select MacintoshHD in the panel on the left, select the FirstAid tab and click: Verify If DU reports errors, click Repair. When it's finished, from the Menu Bar select Utilities/Startup Disk and select MacintoshHD 10.x.x and click Restart.
If you aren't using a disk utility you can force maintenance tasks, go here:
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT2319?viewlocale=en_US
Make certain you always have sufficient disk space available:
Right or control click the MacintoshHD icon on your Desktop, then click: Get Info. In the Get Info window, click the discovery triangle so it's facing down. You will see; Capacity and Available Make sure you have 10% available disk space, 15% is better.
Tip... try to not run memory hogging apps at the same time like Photoshop and iTunes simultaneously.
Carolyn