"I give up"

Well if you're on the German side in WWII eventually you'll have to, that Churchill is a bulldog. :up:

I have XP Media Edition, similar to XP Pro but with some fluffware. After a OS reinstall I usually have to remove a bunch of stuff from startup, or change the settings in START, Control Panel, Administrative Tools, Services. Particularly crap like Adobe and Java automatic updates, which insist on setting themselves to automatic startup then check the internet to see if there's an update every two minutes while you're trying to run a game. Most likely cause of any problem after a new OS install is conflicting crap that really doesn't need to be running.

Other possibility is some DirectX files didn't get installed, START, RUN, type DXDIAG in the RUN window to see what you have.

"Don't install SH3 into the default path - as SP3 came with some sort of UAC."

I had to install SP-3 for one of the Trainz patches, no UAC here. AFAIK Vista was the first Windows to have UAC.

...same. worked fine.

Separate drive, no go.
It's gotta be the win update.

It doesn't have to be a different drive. Just not in "Program Files". So any other folder created in the C-drive should do fine to avoid UAC. If it is actually present in SP3, I'm not sure myself. But it can't hurt to install it elsewhere.

I just checked this post http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/showthread.php?t=144708 , it seems the problem is not XP SP3.

There is surely another problem with your case.

True - there was no UAC in SP3 - nor in XP. Just some system file protection and limitet non-administrator access. Should have been no problem with SH3. Still I'm quite sure I didn't install into default path for some reason.

Patboot - did you install the SP1a/2 first?
http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/w...ice-pack-3-sp3

Mitt, XP and everything came on a factory image disc, and I simply let MS do its own thing as far as updates. I assume it had Sp1x at a minimum.
Again, I was playing on this system just fine, minus SP-3, not a few months ago. XP version is '2002', not the x64. AMD Athlon64 FX-62,
4gb ram, and 2x Nvidia 7900 GTX cards in SLI compliant.

Just to add- thanks everyone for scratching thier heads over this.
My hairs been pulled out so its easy for me now.

Would you mind to uninstall SP3 from your computer to see how the game will react to it ?

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/950249

That is what I was thinking of doing, Aras. My concern is what other programs this might affect.

Never had the problem you are experiencing, however I have done more than a few re-formats of my computer when I have had issues with it. I have an external 1tb hard drive to back all of my stuff on, and all the necessary discs-files to do a reinstall.

Its a hassle and time consuming, but worth it in order to sometimes correct issues with games or windows related issues for that matter.

One of my friends is working in IT Business for more than 10 years. I explained your situation to him. He advised to not to uninstall SP3 since it eliminates some Security Vulnerabilities.

However he said you may try your chance with “Compatibility". Right click to sh3.exe > Properties > Compatibility > Select Run this application in "XP SP 2" or another one that suits you and "Run as Administrator".

Well Patboot, it is pretty difficult to imagine what happened as long as you don't want to provide some information on your proceedings.

As far as I understand it
- you formatted your harddisk - (why?) and reinstalled WinXP.
- you used Windows Update to level up to state of the art :)
- you reinstalled SH3 (did you?) and it doesn't want to start - or so...

Did you install other software successfully?
What SH3 version do you try to run? Is it starforced?
Did you update your drivers?
Did you install DirectX9.c?

That's the whole problem right there, not SP-3. Windows XP Update is broken, has been for some time. And MS is not about to fix it. If your XP system is functioning correctly, then the update service works okay. It's when you reformat/reinstall that it turns into a nightmare. The simplest thing to do would be to reformat again, reinstall everything from your factory disc, turn off windows update and leave it off. Try googling "windows xp update broken" and see how many results you get and how far back it goes.

Well - Microsoft tries to find support for pushing people to update XP to Win7 or Win8. The official XP support ends in April 2014 and I would not be astonished if MS is not highly motivated to fix a "broken update function". :03:

Honi soit qui mal y pense.

If you really want to reinstall, get you the SP1a, SP2 and SP3 as downloads - they are still available on the internet.
I may link you a 451 MB install routine of all the critical and high security XP patches since Sp3 - up to date - including February 2014.

You would not need to run Windows Update at all, you could even deactivate the service.