MSI K7N2 Delta2 Platinum + Corsair mem = hell

Question

Alright, Last christmas I got an MSI K7N2 Delta2 Platinum Mobo. I had an AMD Athlon XP 3000+
w/333mhz FSB. I was using cheapo generic ram which worked, but had horrible performance.
So I bought the TWINX1024-3200XL, Corsair 1GB(2x512) PC3200 400mhz DDR-Ram.
So........when I set that up, I got HUGE instability problems. While playing Half-Life 2, the game
would randomly go BSOD, which I didn't get with the cheapo ram. So I went into the options and
I changed the bios settings from By SPD (which set it to 200mhz fsb) to Auto (which changed it
to 166mhz after detecting my 166mhz fsb cpu), at which point the instability ended. But every
time I tried to run it at 400mhz, tons of crashing and BSODs in HL2 as well as windows. So I've
been using it at 333mhz for the past 6 or so months without any problems, aside from the fact
that I can't run my $300 ram at stock speed.
After reading some threads here and at other forums, I learned that apparently my
motherboard doesn't allow the cpu/ram to run async. Which would make some degree of
sense, since when they ran sync, both at 333mhz, I encountered no crashing. However, I just
bought an AMD Athlon XP 3200+ w/400mhz fsb and I was hoping that the problems would be
over. Alas, no. With the bios set to By SPD at 400mhz, Half-Life 2 (which is what I use to test
system stability, since Memtest 86, Prime 95, etc. All ran through all the tests and for over 24
hours without a single error, then the second I play HL2, it crashes) crashes within 1 minute.  So
I angrily restart and change the bios settings, this time I set it to Auto, which is also 400mhz now due to the 400mhz fsb CPU. I was actually able to play Half-Life 2 flawlessly for about 45 minutes, I made it past the driving phase on the buggy, shot down the chopper, then I eliminated all resistance near the crane. Unfortunately, once everything was dead silent and I pressed R to reload, BSOD. >=|
Is my motherboard a piece of crap that doesn't support the ram, or is the ram bad? Has anybody else been able to run these two (MSI K7N2 Delta2 Platinum + Corsair PC3200 Performance Ram) together with perfect stability? Please help! I'm going nuts. =*|
Many Thanks!
~Takeda
--System Specs--
Windows XP Professional SP1
Antec SX1040B2 File Server Case
550watt Antec TrueControl PSU
MSI K7N2 Delta2 Platinum
AMD Athlon XP 3200+/400mhz FSB (2.2GHz)
Thermaltake Volcano 12
1GB(2x512) Corsair Twinx1024XL Dual Channel
ATI All-In-Wonder 9800 Pro
Sound Blaster Audigy 2ZS Platinum
Pioneer 10x DVD Drive
Sony DRU-700A
Western Digital 120.0GB 7200RPM HD ATA/100
Western Digital 120.0GB 7200RPM HD ATA/100
nForce Ethernet Adapter w/Cable line
Logitech MX500 Optical Mouse
Logitech Elite Keyboard
19" Envision Monitor EN985e
Logitech Z-680 5.1 Speakers

Answer 1

well, for the errors. In half-life 2, after however much playtime, the screen will just randomly go blue, without any official windows message or error code, forcing me to manually restart with the reset button. It's done this for the most part. Other times, when I change the settings, the game will just boot me back to the desktop, giving me a visual basic runtime error. Oddly enough, when I set the ram to 166mhz fsb, the game is totally stable. I've also just updated to the newest bios 11.50 and tried all of the previous settings as well as the "optimized defaults" and "fail-safe defaults" all still result in the crashing.
Yeah, I've tested other games. The results were mixed though. certain games like Need For Speed Hot Pursuit 2 would lockup, other games like command and conquer generals seemed to mostly be stable, with a few random crashes. The problem is that I haven't really gotten any true BSODs in games, I just get lockups. However, windows would give BSODs, but they seemed like they were driven by faulty hardware, since it would be random and would go away entirely once I underclocked the ram.
Other times in the past when I've run the ram at 200mhz fsb, windows would randomly crash when I was browsing the web. In those cases it would give me a stop message and an error number. But I haven't gotten then so far today. I can't remember what all the errors were, but there were about 2-3 random crashes related to ntfs.sys and other system files. So at first, I thought maybe it was just a windows problem, but I had just freshly formatted and reinstalled windows, so it seemed unlikely. And of course, the second I changed it back to 166mhz fsb, I was able to keep my computer on for a week, playing half-life 2, doom 3, command and conquer generals, as well as tons of other games and general web browsing without a single incident. So the problem, although highly vague, seems to be related directly to the ram, if just by the fsb change.
I dunno, these are really really odd problems, never encountered these before in like 6 years of tweaking my comps, so I'm guessing that it's either just an incompatibility with my motherboard/ram (in which case I'm screwed), my mobo is broken, or my ram is broken. I think my only real option left, now that I've bought a new $130 cpu to match the ram is to RMA the ram and hope that it somehow works. But the fact that it's been able to pass prime95 and memtest86 flawlessly makes me concerned as to whether or not corsair will be able to diagnose a problem, if there is one, with the ram if I do RMA it. sigh.
I'm not sure if my video card is underpowered, since I have a 550watt psu and the radeon 9800 isn't too much of a hog. But I think I may RMA that as well. damn, I dunno.     
*update*
Correction, it seems that now I have a 200mhz fsb cpu, setting the ram to 6:5 for 166mhz causes windows to almost immediately lock up. I'm guessing that's part of the whole unable to run the cpu/ram async thing.     
Also, when I tried changing the latency to 2.5 and 3.0, I got the following error:
Many thanks!
~Takeda