System:

 
I have two major problems which make me think all is not well.
 
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1) Windows will not update successfully
 
I have Windows set to notify me when updates are available - here is how the update status as it appears now:
 

 
As you can see, there are a lot of available updates.
 
If I hit the Install updates button, everything seems to go according to plan and I receive the prompt to restart my system.
 
Everything seems to go according to plan:
 


 
However, I always end up getting an error message similar to this:
 

 
And when I then check the update status, I get a message saying that the updates have failed.
 
I've tried updating them all at once and one at a time. Sometimes the updates seem to 'stick', but on subsequent reboots they all eventually are lost. This has been happening for over six months I would image.
 
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2) Small, but regular 'glitches' - e.g: audio skips, mouse pointer freezes and stutters, programs seem to hang for a few seconds etc.
 
At first, I thought this was a problem with my old Line 6 TonePort UX2 (I use this as my only soundcard) as I noticed the skipping/pausing audio at first. However, I've updated all the drivers and even tried another TonePort and the problem persists.
 
However, since first becoming aware of the audio problem, I've noticed that these glitches in audio often coincide with other programs temporarily stopping whatever they are doing. I also noticed that if I'm moving the mouse pointer around the screen, it will 'stutter' as I'm moving it.
 
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Any help and advice most gratefully received

Have you looked in the event viewer?

Steve, make sure you do a complete backup (if you haven't already) before farting around with it

I'll assume you have plenty of HDD space on both your system drive and the drive with the swap file on it (if not the same).
 
The first thing that popped into my head would be to do a clean over the top OS install (reinstall). 
 
M$ also suggest this (among other things): http://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/949358
 
My reasoning is that your h/w is probably fine.  Computer h/w generally works or it doesn't.  It might be worth checking the RAM seating, make sure all connectors are plugged into the MOBO etc. but my suspicions are that software is to blame (e.g. corrupted data).
 
I'd also suggest running chkdsk against your HDDs: start->computer->r-clink HDD->properties->tools tab->Check now...  Check both 'Automatically fix file system errors' and 'Scan for and attempt recovery of bad sectors'.
 
As well as the above, you could try uninstalling any recent software / updates to see if something there is causing problems.
 
Fresh OS install would be my first go-to though.
 
HTH :-)
 
 
 
 

Check your temperatures as well - if they're on the high side, consider giving it a good clean out, and reseat everything like ston suggests

Worth running something like Malwarebytes as well. And check your task manager. You can Google all the processes it shows to check if any are suspect.

Sometimes though I've just ended up doing a complete reinstall. It's a huge PITA especially with lots of audio software to reinstall, but with a little preparation you can get it done in a day, and it actually kind of nice to start afresh and reorganize everything from scratch.

The update problem is almost certainly a software problem, not an indication that the machine is near failure. As stated above, make sure you have enough free space to download all the stuff that you have missed. Try the Fixit Wizard to see if that works. Otherwise you may need to do a repair install. 
 
http://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/949358
 

 
Thanks for the input folks - I'll let you know how it goes.
 
I wonder, is there a chance these two problems are connected?

I have had instances where for some unknown reason, Windows Update gets a hiccup and cannot apply updates beyond a certain point.
 
There is some kind of Windows Update 'Fix It' program that Microsoft makes available, and that always took care of that kind of situation for me - and it's been at least 3 times that I can recall (I work on or build around 50-60 computers a year so it's a bit blurry, but I do remember that situation).
 
I think I went through some sort of Windows Update Troubleshooting dialog, and then it offered the Fix It download, which fixed it.
 
Worth a try anyways, 
 
Bob Bone