Having the same issue
I have an EVGA 7900 and a Samsung 22" LCD. I have had the same issue, I just installed the latest driver from Nvidia and it does not change anything. I have had the issue when trying to open a photo, when trying to set a screensaver and when trying to open a program that I had not run before and when booting up once. What I have noticed is that if I let the computer sit for about 1 minute, it come right back with the program open that I was trying to run and it then runs fine.
I have not had a chance to tweak the display settings but I will have to do it.
To me, I would think its something to do with the 7900, since everyone who posted here has one, but I have not checked around much yet.
I may try switching back to my onboard video to test.
My motherboard is an N-force board with an onboard Nvidia card. Does anyone else have onboard video as well?