Windows 7 only boots in safe mode - otherwise EXTREMELY slow

Athlon II x3 4553.3 ghz - unlocked and running at 3.58 ghz (set at 1.5v)
Asus m5a97 am3+
8 gb Kingston HyperX
Maxtor 300gb HDD
HD 6770 1 gb
Windows 7 Ultimate

I played Skyrim for like 8 hours last night and finally went to sleep at like 7am (lol). I left the computer on and it went into sleep mode. I came back to it at about 4pm today and it woke up but was EXTREMELY slow. Simple menu popups and windows took FOREVER to open. I rebooted and boots fine to password screen.

After that windows now won't even load or may just take several minutes to load which I haven't waited for given there's an obvious problem. I rebooted and went to safe mode and everything works fine there. I have updates disabled so Windows is clean with no updates. It seems like a HDD issue but I can use HDD fine in safe mode and doesn't seem to have any issues. I tried to disable the 4th core in UEFI Bios and it still reads as a Phenom x4 B55 but not sure this is even the issue as it ran fine for a couple weeks. I ran CPU stress test a week ago with no errors. Temps seem fine at 29c on idle and 51c max running Skyrim

PLEASE HELP. I just built this computer and I'm losing my mind. Thanks in advance.

What happens if you return the CPU speed to stock?

With it a recent build, double check all your cable connections (unplug and plug back in). Maybe somthing is working loose?

Try it with only one stick of ram at a time, maybe a bad stick?

Is Skyrim or Windows pirated/downloaded? Sounds like you have a virus on your machine. (if you just downloaded and installed skyrim and then played it for 8hrs for the first time, thats probably your issue.) Go into safe mode and start running the usual stuff to clean up an infected machine. (AVG and avast are some free Antivirus scanners, trend micron has a good online scanner. I like to also use hijackthis but you need to know what you're doing.) Once its clean you need to update windows. Those updates make it harder for you machine to get infected.

OK connections are fine. And virus seems unlikely as Safe Mode works but not Safe mode w/ networking. I noticed the DRAM LED light on the mobo turns red. So I want to check the Ram but will 2 dual channel chips run by themselves? Or do I already know that RAM is bad if led goes red?

Update: Ok checked RAM and removing either stick does nothing to help. The LED just flashes red once and turns off and has to be lit continuously for there to be a prob. I am now getting this problem during normal safe mode. Certain programs hang for a long time before functioning. I ran Webroot anti-virus and only threat was some spamware from a cd label program i got from CNET (go figure).

This is seeming more and more like a Hardware problem. HDD allows me to copy files to USB in safe mode. Could it be just barely working? I eben remember the Fry's tech saying it sounded funny when he was installing my mobo/cpu/ram for me. I kept my old HDD to save $$.

I am dying here. I just spent over $400 on this upgrade and I am stumped. Is there a good HDD diagnostic i can run in safe mode that'll tell me?

I found this on the Microsoft Support page:

You could do this to fix your problem:
- Boot into Safe Mode
- Click Start
- Type the word msconfig into the Search box and press Enter
- Untick every tick mark under the Startup tab.
- Click the Services tab, then tick the box that hides the Microsoft services.
- Untick every remaining tick mark.
- Physically disconnect the machine from the Internet.
- Reboot in Normal Mode.
- If this fixes the problem, restore the tick marks in groups of 8 until you find the culprit, then leave it unticked.

Worked for me.

update #2 - I ran startup repair from Windows 7 and at first said it repaired but then I can't even get into logon screen - it just freezes completely with Windows logo animation comes up prior to the logon screen. I tried it again and it said 'NoOSinstalled'...however...Safemode still works. This is completely NUTS

Try to defragment your HDD.

I uninstalled both my display and wireless pci net card and still can't boot to normal windows. I also did what luckie300 said earlier and disabled all startup programs save microsoft and no dice

Nope it's activated and everything - I can do updates with no problems. Is webroot not good? And nobody else on my private torrent site is having this issue with their copy of the same windows. I just reinstalled it again and it's working fine now. I ran webroot immediately after installing Win7 and comes up clean. I lowered Cpu voltage from 1.5 to 1.3 and I'm keeping it as a 3 core without unlocking. I am also going to monitor my GPU temp while gaming to see if there's any issues there as well.

It may sound ridiculous but make sure the date and time on your desktop are correct (double check the year). I'm serious. If they aren't it means your motherboard battery is dead and you must replace it.

Check the Event Viewer and see if any Windows service is hanging at startup. I go through a simmilar thing, because the LanmanServer service takes FOREVER to connect to my home network, which basically locks teh PC until it finally connects to the network.