Optimizing performance in a new PC

[ProfessorUtopia]

I'll be putting together a new PC soon and I'll be using it mainly for EverQuest 2, which is a monster for system requirements. Nautrally I want the best performance I can get, and before I consider overclocking I'd like to look into tweaking other aspects of my PC.

I've never built my own computer before, and I really don't know anything about fine tuning any of the more advanced settings of a PC, so that's why I'm turning to you guys.

Here are the specs of my soon-to-be PC...
Processor: Intel LGA 775 Pentium 4 w/ 3.0 GHZ
Motherboard: Chaintech 915P LGA 775
RAM: Corsair 184 pin 1 GB (2x 512)
Video Card: Chaintech Nvidia GeForce 6600 GT w/ 128 MB
Hard Drive: Western Digital 160 GB 7200 RPM SATA
Operating System: Microsoft Windows XP Professional

I'd like to hear what kinds of things you guys might do after you first boot up your PC (After installing windows and drivers and such of course ) and any other general tweaks you would recommend to help boost performance. I've read that Windows XP as a lot of unnecessary, and in some cases unwanted, features that can be disabled.

Some people on the EQII tech forums recommend disabling HT and AA to increase performance, as EQII doesn't support these features.

[WhatsThisBoxFor?]

I would disable services acording to: http://www.blackviper.com/

[ProfessorUtopia]

Awesome, just the kind of "main points" I was looking for... I got myself lost on tweakxp.com

[Force Flow]

Check out this in-house article: http://www.pcmech.com/show//677/

It goes over the most significat tweaks and most common annoyances for 2k and XP.

[enhanced08]

win98 is said to be one of the best gaming OSs microsoft has come out with. win2k and xp have too many background apps running trying to keep the system running smooth but at the same time wasting resources. you might try getting a copy of win98 se and running that.

[JPMiller]

Use the following to make the majority of changes more easily...
XP-Smoker... for tweaking windows and getting rid of alot of the MS garbage that hogs resources.
TuneXP... wich does alot of the things XPSmoker doesnt...
RegscrubXP... one of the better registry cleaners...
Diskeeper 8 ... ... soooooooo much better than windows neutered stripped down defragmenter
EverestHome...... in my opinion the best diagnostic tool for windows Ive used... im STILL finding things out using this proggy... its much more in depth than anyone gives it credit for..

[Force Flow]

Originally Posted by enhanced08dotcom win98 is said to be one of the best gaming OSs microsoft has come out with. win2k and xp have too many background apps running trying to keep the system running smooth but at the same time wasting resources. you might try getting a copy of win98 se and running that.

Actually, I beg to differ. I have a triple boot system running and have tested the gaming abilities of 98SE, 2000 and XP, ending up with a very noticable difference between 98SE & 2000 vs. XP. If you have the hardware to run it (which ProfessorUtopia definately does), XP is definately a much more capable O/S for gaming.