Ah... Another fine case of Mircrosoft thinking they know exactly what I want and how I should do it.

Let's back up to yesterday first.

***

This is the story of two computers.
Hal

My month old companion that's given me many an issue since I installed his OS. The latest being my inability to burn CDs now. But that's not what this thread is about.

Aries

My four year old computer that has my free and legit copy of WinXP Pro freshly installed on it's little harddrive of 12 gig. The computer just BARELY exceeds the recommended specs to run it.

On with the story.

I burned the image of XP Pro yesterday that I'd downloaded earlier in the week. Wanting to try it out, I pulled Aries down from the attic. For now, it's serving as a test bed so I can finally decide just how much I either hate, loathe, and despise the system, or if I might be able to accept it's presence and put it on Hal.

Hal has had too many problems since I built him. All of them software driven. I think part of the issue could be that it's a custom built system. Who knows. But I've had my optical drives vanish at one point, I've had one stop working for no reason, my burner is no longer recognized as such, my USB ports are acting weird. I have a USB joystick and camera. I used the same port when installing both. It seems as though Windows decided to install them JUST for that port. They don't work on any other port, and I have 6. The issues go on. Frankly, I'm a bit tired of it now. The system works, but it seems to always work with an inconvience. This is where Aries and XP come into play.

I don't want to wipe Hal's HD and start over again. It wouldn't be my first choice, but it's getting to the point where I might as well. Especially if it'll cure the issues I'm having. I mainly downloaded XP for convinence. It was offered, I took it. But everyone likes to play with new software, which is why I pulled Aries down and installed it.

Initially, I'm impressed. For a system that barely passed the requirments, it ran quite smoothly with all of the visual effects crap turned on. It also managed to find drivers for the modem, sound card, and ethernet card. Somthing the previous OS (Win2k) could seemingly never fix. Of course, right after it's installed, I go about turning crap off, and installing the essentials. Firefox, Norton's Systemworks, Easy CD Creator 5, and all of the updates on the Security Update CD. That took up most of my evening. The result? I don't exactly feel like I'll be jumped at the next corner anymore. I feel safer but not safe. Safe is sitting on a computer running OS X. That is safe to me.

So, I obviously have some items now that I haven't be able to take care of. The solutions elude me. And then there are the questions.

1. It's probably been gone over countless times before, but what exactly is this activation crap all about? Since it never applied to me, I never paid attention to it.
   
2. How the hell do you keep XP from maximizing every damned window it opens?
   
   Maybe not maximizing, but takeing up three fourths of the screen for a folder that holds one item. I know all versions of Windows do that initially, but XP seems to be particually bad about it. It's begun to annoy the hell out of me,
   
3. I need a list of services that should be disabled permanently.
   
   I ran through the list and diabled the ones that I know of, but that's only a select few. I'm almost positive there's a LOT more.
   
4. This one is easy since everyone wants it. How does one kill Windows Messenger?
   
   The worthless thing poped up earlier after I set up internet access and rebooted. It didn't want to close the normal way, so I Ctl-Alt-Delted it's ***.
   
5. Hal and Aries are succesfully talking across the Lan. All well and good. However, and this relates to my initial comments, Windows seems to think it knows what I want. It refuses to allow me access to any user folder inside Documents and Settings, Program Files, or the Windows directory.
   
   I don't know about you guys, but I happen to like placeing files on my desktop when moving them over a Lan. any idea on how to fix that crap?
   [/list=1]
   
   Right. So that's where I stand right now. I'm sure I'll run into more crap later. Mircosoft's idea of a user friendly environment seems to be one in which you do things it's way, not your way, and the options to turn it off aren't always obvious.
   
   At the moment, Xp seems to run fairly well on Aries. Of course, back before I got Hal, I was running 2k on a similar machine, and never had any problems.
   
   I'm open to any other suggestions and help you can provide. I'm not moving to reformat Hal anytime in the near future. And no, Linux is not an option. I'd prefer to be able to use my computer without having to learn about a new OS and struggling to make all of my programs work.
   
   That'd be all for now.

O.k, I've had the same problems before. I need some more info... What OS are you running on Hal? And as far as I know, there is no way to enable filesharing over your LAN to the Documents and settings or Program files in XP. I know, it annoys the crap outta me, too. But I live with it. About the only permanent fix would be to got to Linux. Get it free here.


EDIT Where did you get XP free?

4. I assume you mean Windows' MSN client, not the net send thingy.

I have some good news and some bad news. The good news is you can make it go away. The bad news is that it will come back often, especially when you update it via windows update.

To get rid of it, try the following things:

See if there is an option in the program to have it not load on boot.
check the startup tab of msconfig (in the run menu.)
remove it from "Startup" in the start menu.
Don't even download an update from Windows Update pertaining to it, or else it will come back with force.

1. it will refuse to work if you don't activate within a month or so, just do it online while you still can or call Microsoft for free

3. http://www.ntsvcfg.de/ntsvcfg_eng.html <- Configuring NT-services securely

4. depending on what you mean, you can uninstall msn messenger normally

I have NEVER used Windows Update, and I never will. Anything that needs patching I download directly.

For clarification, I'm talking about Windows Messenger, the garbage that came with the system. I have zero use for it. I stopped using the MSN Messenger type program a year and a half ago in favor of Trillian.

Hal is running Win2k Service Pack 4. The system is basically the same setup I had on the previous computer. The only changes would be that this one was built from scratch and thus required I install software and drivers to make things run. Now that I consider that, it might just be hoards of software conflicts. Gah. That's the problem there. I don't KNOW what the problem is. All I know are symptoms. Symptoms that could be anything.

I activated it last night. What the deal if you have to reformat? Are you allowed a certain number of activations? That doesn't make sense to me right off, but when the hell has MS EVER made sense?

As for where I managed to get XP for free... College has it's advantages. I'll gladly post a screen of the email I recieved confirming my download for proof if you'd like. Minus the account info I need to download it and my CD key, of course.

Keep in mind, Aries is really only running to see how much I really like or hate XP. I need to do something with Hal. Be it reinstall Win2k, or upgrade to XP. I don't like either option, but I'm tired of problems.

You can only activate it a handful of times with its proper key, by then you need to call Microsoft for free, give them some hardware dependant code and answer that you installed too often and they give you the key without further hassle

hmm, i've only ever had to activate windows once and i've had numerous hardware changes and the occasional reinstall (fixing my boot sector after removing linux several times).

Your problems with HAL sound like motherboard problems. Seriously. USB ports, missing optical drives. Maybe PSU problems.

For the rest, it's just like any other OS--it takes time to adjust.

I suppose it's possible, but even that doesn't make sense. If it was a motherboard problem, I would expect the ports to just flat out not work. That isn't they case.

I pluged the Joystick in one. Windows detects it, I install the drivers. Now, lets say I want to plug it in next time to a port in front. Instead of recalling that it's already installed the joystick, it want's to go and do it all over again. Somehow that just doesn't sound like a montherboard problem to me...

I think I might have figured out today why the DVD drive refuses to burn. It might have something to do with iTunes. Before that happened, I'd updated iTunes 4.1.1 to 4.5ish (whatever the new version is). I disliked the new version for a few reasons, so I yanked it off, and put 4.1.1 back. Doing that might have confused a driver somewhere, or deleted it, who knows. I've already tried uninstalling iTunes and reinstalling again. No luck.

Fixing what it's doing isn't what annoys me. It's the fact that I just flat out can't determine the cause from the symptoms that annoys me. Otherwise I'm sure most of those issues would be easy to fix.

Unless you're talking about Automatic windows update (In which case I agree with you), that's just dumb. If you run WIndows Update, you can choose what to install and what not to install... Example: Install all of the secuirty patches, but not WIndows Media Player 10.
Yes, you can do that.