Spinning Beachball on many applications

Question

I am running 10.7.2 on a client computer (iMac Quad Core, 8GB RAM) with the network home directory on a 10.6.7 server.  Since upgrading to lion, many applications stall when performing simple tasks (copy, paste, open, etc.).  I've have numerous issues with Preview, Mail, iCal, Address Book.  I'll open a file, the application will stall for about 30-60 secondsm, and then complete the task.  I've repaired permissions, repaired the disk, monitored Activity Monitor, but cannot figure out the root cause.  Any advice on what I can check?  Are there known issues with 10.6.8 server w/ 10.7.2 client?
Please help!  I have had nothing but bad luck with lion.  BTW, I'm running the 10.7.2 at home with the same computer, but w/o network home directories and have many of the same problems.
Thanks,
Bill

Answer 1

Okay Guys & Dolls,
New development - I think this may have worked!  I took the advice of Stanley Horwitz, and opened the Console App; I read through the strings of data that happened in the last 8 hours or so, and there were many instances of errors with the DIV X Plugin...
So, I checked in on my System Preferences, and it turned out that it was built on the 32-Bit Architecture, because when I clicked on its icon, the pane tells me that it will need to quit and close out first to reenter the 32-Bit world.  So, of course, I uninstalled* that, and I also did the same with all the other old-old-old plugins in my System Preferences.  Then I restarted, and it seems to (at least) be doing much better than it was...
Hopefully this will be the solution.
Give it a try, MISC_IT!
*I recommend the free program AppCleaner to do all my dirty work...