Buffering(?) issue

To start this off, i really am not sure if this is a hardware or software issue so I'm stabbing in the dark on this one.

I recently got a new desktop built for me, got an odd problem with my new computer.... whenever i'm playing any full screen game, whenever i try and alt tab to something else it just... pauses for like 3 seconds and then does it, like a full blown 3 second freeze, and when i tab back, it does it again... like, everything freezes completely for 3 seconds, if i tab from fullscreen to fullscreen it's 6 seconds... now, my comp stats are (copy and paste from my computer properties)

System:
Windows XP pro V2002 Svc pack 2

Computer:
Intel(R) Core(TM)2 CPU
6600 @2.40GHz
2.40GHz, 2GB of Ram

Page file size is initial3070GB max4096 GB
vid card is: Radeon X1900 512mb mem dual dvi

any suggestions? did some snooping around in bios and looked at the chipsets and everything in there looks just fine, i honestly can't figure the problem...

 

Is it on your Hardrive or is it Online?

 

Keep in mind as well, some games alter settings while running, one of those settings being video. It may be a situation where its just adjusting from one resolution to another.

Some games also recognize the alt-tab feature of Windows and 'pause' themselves. This can sometimes take a couple seconds to do as well.

And then there are some games that just don't respond well to alt-tabbing.

I wouldn't worry too much about it unless you have problems switching smaller apps or windows.

What games are you running btw?

 

I did research this a touch, this has been going with everything from Star Craft to WoW. online offline, pretty much any app that's fullscreen.