XP SP2 disables any driver that's been known to cause
conflicts. It disabled my laptop's speakers, which have
had no problems with, so I uninstalled it 10 minutes
after installation. Same with my PC, except it screwed up
network settings or LAN card drivers, I'll never know,
it's gone now.
At some time you may want to install this service pack or a
later one. In that case, uninstall the offending driver, obtain
the latest version of the driver and of any configuration
software and install that. You can do that before or after
installing the service pack.
SP2 doesn't usually destroy network settings, but it is eager to
shut down safety risks. For example, you have to open the
firewall for File and Printer Sharing to get your network
running. By default the SP2 firewall blocks that.
The tighter security is also sensitive to other offending
software, like Winsock catalog layers created by adware,
however, it also provides a new Winsock catalog repair
procedure.
I've been assisting with SP2 related problems for quite some
time now and must say that the cases where SP2 was actually the
cause of a disruption are very few and very far between. In
almost all cases SP2 worked very well and the problems were
already there before SP2 had been installed or were caused by
the user not opening the new firewall correctly. Microsoft could
be blamed for the latter, but they felt pressure to make Windows
more secure, so in a way they had the choice between being shot
or hanged.
I see no reason to recommend against installing SP2.
Hans-Georg
