phones and gameplay

i can't have phones on any of my lots in my game. my sims freeze anytime the phone rings or i try to have them use one. really sucks for normal (what is normal?) gameplay. i have all eps plus h&m, teen stuff, mansion & garden and kitchen & bath stuff packs. i have tried uninstall and reinstall with no downloads added and still the same thing. i have since gone ahead and added cc stuff and some hacks but only those that were no prob before this started. it hasn't always done this. praises to those who have created bots for clean up and gardening and such or i'd be doing not much but directing sims to do all that but as for other stuff that you have to have a phone for, well, it's just lost to me. the game plays just fine without phones tho so there is that but still......
also the audio just goes on as if the game is still in progress while my sims are frozen in place (with phone use). i can click on stuff for a sim to do but they are just stuck wherever they are....at least on my screen they are. the only new thing to come before this started to happen is my son, who has xbox live, hooked up a router to run a line to his room so he can access the internet. could that be the prob? that one was a pain and he had probs with his xbox with it so he got a new one that works so much better but i've been afraid to try the phones again. can you help me with this? (sorry to rattle on for this long)