Thanks for the response.
I am still unsure as to which partition or drive to install VV3, and then where to send captured video to, and where it should do rendering for best results.
Sorry, if I am showing my ignorance about terminology.
Thanks.

Captured video, renderings, and music should go to a dedicated drive. Your second drive would be fine for this. Maybe create a couple of partitions to logically organize things. Install VV to your "Programs" partition. It should be fine there. KKOLBO suggestrions was for you to resize your main C: partition and create a larger swap file. All of this can be easily done with a program such as PartitionMagic.

The way I have mine set up is:
HD 1: Partitioned 3 times...P1:XP pro,I only put my audio/video software on this one[vegas,acid,Sonar,etc...]. My "work" partition. If it doesen't have anything to do with A/V I "DON'T" install it.[10gigs]
P2:XP PRO, internet,email,anti-virus software etc...games too if I wanted to.[10gigs]
P3: left over space I use to keep b.s.[51/2 gigs]

HD 2: audio...Fat32.

HD 3: video...NTFS.

I setup XP pro in "standard pc mode". This is done by pressing and holding down F5 when you see F6 on the install screen. I forget what it asks for in terms of F6 but when you hold down F5 at that time you will be given a choice of what type of setup options you'd like. Standard PC is better for single processor computers. You will find that all your IRQ's WON"T be shared on irq #9 anymore. You'll be able to get your soundcard and 1394 IEEE firewirecard on its own IRQ.

You don't have to get partitioning magic because all you need is on XP.

Right click "My Computer">click on "Manage">Double click "Disk Management". All your partitioning needs right there. I just found out 2 days ago wandering around in XP PRO.
On my "work" partition I have all the graphic effects turned off so as to not waste cpu. No pointer shade blah blah. Look around and set everything to the uglyest mode you can. Your system will fly then. Let me know if you can't find all of them. On the other one I leave everything as is. Really cool to look at!

In Vegas set your Temp file to your "VIDEO" dedicated drive. The same when you capture/export. All your video work should be done there.
For any audio overdub/music to be added to video send it to your audio drive.

I hope that helps!

Plus...maxing out your ram is always a good thing[hopefully in your budget].

you only get partition management in XP if using dynamic disks which aren't compatible with Win2k.

but LKDog, there is no need to increase the size of your WinXP partition. I have never installed an OS on anything larger than a 2GB partition including XP. you can put the swap file on another partition or drive and also put your temp folders on a different partition or drive, so there is no need to dedicate all these GBs to the system partition.

you only get partition management in XP if using dynamic disks which aren't compatible with Win2k.

Now you've lost ME! Dynamic disks? Could you explain a bit more I'm not sure what you mean. From a clean install of XP you could do all your partitioning and then setup each OS one after another. Where would that problem come up?

I have never installed an OS on anything larger than a 2GB partition including XP-Why? I thought about running XP on less than 10 gigs but is it really worth it?

Thanks guys.
I will install the VV3 program on HD#1 on a non-XP Pro partition.
I will put the captures, do edits, and send to dv/tape on HD#2.

I do have ACPI set on this machine. I will have to see if it creates any issues.

One other question.
If I go to 768 MB of sdram from my present 448 will that be a real world difference?

Thanks again.

>>>Now you've lost ME! Dynamic disks? Could you explain a bit more I'm not sure what you mean. From a clean install of XP you could do all your partitioning and then setup each OS one after another. Where would that problem come up?

the original poster was advised to *resize* the system partition. WinXP can only do this without destroying the data if you are using Dynamic disks. this is a new feature of XP. upgrading a disk to dynamic (as opposed to Basic) will give you those new features, but will make the disks unavailable to previous versions of Windows. but yes, you are correct in that you can install XP and then use it to create the rest of the partitions. if you are doing dual boot with Win2k, I advise installing Win2k FIRST. then use *it* to create the rest of the partitions. (it has the same thing as WinXP under Disk Management)

if you install XP then 2k, you may not be able to boot into XP without doing some serious repairing. that's been my experience anyway. still trying to nail that down for sure. 2k then XP = no probs.

>>I have never installed an OS on anything larger than a 2GB partition including XP-Why? I thought about running XP on less than 10 gigs but is it really worth it?

I don't see the point of running the OS on anything larger. using a 2GB partition I can easily make a ghost of my system partition and store the image on a CD-R (it comes in less than 600MB compressed). so when something goes wrong, I can restore the OS with the all important *Registry* without messing up any of my applications or data.

if you do this you must follow some simple rules.
- no installing programs on system drive. use dedicated partition or drive for apps.
- must move temp/tmp to different drive. this is done in the System | Environment Variables dialog
- should place Pagefile on different drive. if dual/triple booting then you can assign the same file/location for all OS's and save space.

if you need more than 2GB for your system partition it just means you aren't organized! :D there's no harm in it, but what a mess! :D