I OC-ed my barton 2500+ 1.83ghz to 2.05ghz.

changed some FSB (multiplier unchanged) and vcore voltage.

tested it for 48 hours using OCCT, Super pi, prime95, etc.

even did benchmark with 3dmark2005, etc.

it's rock stable for years, well, 1 and a half years to be exact.

but recently, one of my ram died, memtest showed crap load of errors, so I junked it and bought new rams, problem solved.

........... and then.........

my newly formatted winXP system starts acting up, nothing serious like reboot or freeze or anything, but stuff like:

1. Browsers crashing, firefox and IE7, different modules crashing everytime, ask me to send report and sh*t, same old boring useless warning.

2. Add/remove program sub module crashes. Which mean I cant open add/remove program without it crashing.

3. Setup files and applications I downloaded that used to work now start giving me strange errors (ex: The file is corrupted, plz redownload and sh*t)

No, it's not viruses or spyware, I've checked VERY VERY thoroughly. (hijackthis, AVG, ada-ware, registry, everything)

It's a newly formatted system, keep that in mind, and I have not browse or downloaded much with it.

Thing is .........

I've switched it back to default clock now, and the problem seems to go away, time will tell .........

But my question is: Is it possible that a stable OC system start crapping out after some time have passed? Years perhaps?

I mean, running those "un-recommended" voltage and settings for so many years could "eat something up" in the circuitry or something.

I know the old saying: "an OC-ed system will have shorter life span" bla bla bla.

But is this true in my case?