FF9 Crash, DDR Euro Version uncontrollable

FF9 Crash/freeze

OK. I have searched the forum and there doesn't seem to be anyone else having this problem. Correct me if I am wrong.

Here we go:

When I play FF9, sometimes during battle or just normal gameplay, the game would freeze up. These freezes can take 2 different forms:

1) Game slows down almost totally, then stutters for around half a minute, then goes back to normal speed.
2) Game freezes at screen, sound that was playing at that time keeps repeating and repeating, ESC or CTRL-ALT-DEL do not work. Have to do a cold reboot.

Settings:

System:
AMD Athlon 900mhz
45 Gb HD
Playing CD 1 via ISO
640 Mb RAM
GeForce 2 MX
Latest version of Epsxe
scph7502 bios (same problem with 1001)

Plugin: Pete's DX6 D3D Driver 1.1.53
Author: Pete Bernert
GFX card: NVIDIA GeForce2 MX/MX 400

Resolution/Color:
- 800x600 Fullscreen - [32 Bit]

Textures:
- R5G5B5A1
- Filtering: 0
- Caching: 2

Framerate:
- FPS limit: off
- Frame skipping: off
- FPS limit: 125

Compatibility:
- Offscreen drawing: 2
- Framebuffer texture: 1
- Alpha multipass: on
- Mask bit: off
- Advanced blending: none

Misc:
- Scanlines: off [0]
- Unfiltered FB: off
- Dithering: off
- Full vram: off
- Game fixes: off [00000000]

Please Advise.