I have crossed over to the XP side..Help us all..

[Apache]

Well after I messed up my ME install (poking my nose where it shouldn't have been). I reformated my computer again.......
I decided to go ahead with a clean slate and use XP. Now so far it hasn't bothered me to much..although I haven't tried installing thief back on yet.
Now does anyone have a good video card suggestion?
I want one that will be able to play T3 and do video capturing.

[Salvage]

ATI Radeon 9800 PRO All In Wonder 128 MB (http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=14-102-297&depa=1) - $337.00

There are cheaper cards(9700 AIW @295, 9600 AIW@261), but this is the best right now for what you want.

Why not get a capture card and a separate video card? That way you won't have to spend that much extra the next time you get a video card(although it will cost you more with this purchase).

[Lazarus]

Woohoo! Apache's on our side now. :D

I'd say the ATI All in wonders are a great choice. I went with a GeForce FX5600 Ultra 256DDR and Vivo (Video in, Video out). It does the same thing as the ATI, but limits your capturing features. The ATI let's you capture anything thru S-Video or RCA jacks or TV in, so you can capture anything.. and the ATI let's you use other software such as Premeire or another video capture prog to capture.. and the FX only lets you capture whatever comes thru the input jacks, and I believe it doesn't let you capture thru other software.

All you Nvidia users correct me if I'm wrong.

BTW.. Apache. Make sure you go to Windows Update and get all the Critical Updates for XP.
Also... go to http://www.microsoft.com/downloads and grab the 5 Most Popular Downloads.

That should keep you from getting the XP worms and other security stuff. Of all the Windows OS's... W2K and XP get hacked the most.

Welcome aboard. :D

[Lazarus]

Some other things you might want to know about XP.

By Default: XP allows windows to recieve messages from other XP users. This is very annoying once you start to see how many you can get in one day popping up all the time. To disable this:

Go to: Control Panel>Adminstrative Tools>Services, scroll down the list of services to Messenger. Right click on Messenger>Properties. Here you can Disable Messenging, and Stop the immediate process.

ALso. check out my other tweaks here. http://forums.eidosgames.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=36343

[Zaccheus]

Also you may want to switch to Win2K look-and-feel.
(right click on desktop, select properties, and switch to 'Windows Classic' theme).

[Lazarus]

Oh yeah... the Classic windows definately speeds up performance. But I like the eye candy myself. :D

[theBlackman]

While you are here, Laz, as sole user and Admin on my system with XP HOME, I can't use the gedit.msc command.

My system says there ain't no such animal. Is there another way to access the necessary files to use the INET speeder tweak?

[Lazarus]

Oops sorry 'bout that. that feature is for XP Pro only. Laz goes to fix tweak thread. :o

[theBlackman]

Originally posted by Lazarus
Oops sorry 'bout that. that feature is for XP Pro only. Laz goes to fix tweak thread. :o

:D No problem. All is forgiven. LOL

[ChowYunFat]

By Default: XP allows windows to recieve messages from other XP users. This is very annoying once you start to see how many you can get in one day popping up all the time. To disable this: Go to: Control Panel>Adminstrative Tools>Services, scroll down the list of services to Messenger. Right click on Messenger>Properties. Here you can Disable Messenging, and Stop the immediate process.
Thanks for this advice, Lazarus!! I have XP on my laptop & get these obnoxious messages incessantly. I seldom go online with my laptop though so I never had the incentive to figure out how to fix this.