have to always do a maunal shutdown

> hi, i have a brand new laptop (7 dyas old) it is a asus, 2 gig ram, 1.9
> amd
> duel . . . came with latest vista.. i am having a problem which is
> becomming
> more and more regular. i will be using a programme or as i start up a
> programe the programme will not repond and need to be closed. However even
> though the programme has disappeared it still remains running in windows
> task
> manager. i cannot remove it from there by ending the task again. The two
> worst have been adobe premier pro and firefox. The system does not freeze
> and
> i can continue to run as normal however when i try to restart or shut down
> i
> have no response. Occasionally the shut down screen will appear and then
> not
> close. I have to manually hold down the power button to re-boot.
>
> Does any one know what this could be? and why is it only on specific
> programmes?
>
> Thankyou all.