Try booting to Safe Mode this way;
Go back into msconfig.
Choose Boot.INI and place a checkmark in Safe Boot. Click Ok and then Apply.
Reboot and see if you can get into Safe Mode.
When i restart my computer more than 75% of the time it will not reboot right away. i end up manually shutting it off a few times, i have no choice but to wait atleast 5 minutes then everything boots normally. if i dont wait the 5 minutes is when i have problems and it wont reboot...
When this happens does the computer actually shut all the way down before the reboot attempt or is it really hanging at shut down?
How are you trying this?
Start, Turn Off Computer, Turn Off? OR Start, Turn Off Computer, Restart?
startup only anti-virus, firewall and yahoomessanger running.
Do you mean that these three items are supposedly the only items running at Start Up? Why do you have Yahoo Messenger running at Start up? This is totally unnecessary and can easily, and should be, run Manually. Take it out of the Start up. In fact, take all of them out of auto start and see what happens.
What anti-virus and firewall are you running?
There definitely are more...the items in Services for one thing.