> A freshly extracted archive does the same thing for me.

This sounds like a system related problem to me. If a clean install doesn't work, there can't be any damaged cache or settingsfile which may caused problems. XP SP2 should work fine (I use that here, too).
What you can do is: zip the clrmamepro installation (full folder) which crashes for you and send that zip to me (clrmame@clrmame.com)

Roman Scherzer
ClrMamePro