Hi,
You failed to answer the important question of which operating system you are running on.
I have Windows 7 64bit and PSE 8 runs fine on that so we need to find out what is different on your system.
You said that it was working fine up until about two weeks ago, did you make any changes to your system then? Added new software or hardware?
When you reset the preferences, did you get the message about deleting settings?
You can try contacting Adobe by going to the first page www.adobe.com and selecting Support & Learning at the bottom. Scroll down and click on Contact Us. Then you need to answer a few questions and you may be able to start a chat session. I can't be more specific as it varies from country to country.
I should warn you that you may be referred back to this forum as your version is four years old and Adobe only support the current version. The users on this have a wealth of knowledge and can usually help but we rely on you being our eyes when looking at problems on your system.
I am not alone here and there are normally much more knowledgeable people following this thread and will join in if they have any better suggestions.
Brian