Windows XP Service Pack 2 (SP2) - Should I Install it?

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I have not downloaded SP2 yet and I am wondering if I need to. I have Zone Alarm Pro Firewall, CA Ez Antivirus as well as Spy Sweeper already installed on my PC. I have email protection from both the firewall and Antivirus as well as pop up blocking etc. What else will SP2 do for me? In addition, if I do download SP2, will it conflict with the other external software doing the same things?

SP2 is still recommended, because in addition to the big publicity items related to security, it still has tons of other bug fixes and improvements. It should play well with teh items you have listed. Definitely check out the "to do" list in this article before installing: http://ask-leo.com/will_sp2_crash_my_machine.html

Installed sp2 on a new computer this month, xp home edition. After installing sp2 my new computer wouldn't boot. NON SYS disk error. Hard drive fried. Was completely fine with no problems before sp 2. Couldn't do a restore, couldn't get anywhere. My advice is to certainly NOT install this unless you have a back up plan of some sort.

I am a PC Tech and Service Pack 2 definitely affects .net passport info and such. I have a client's PC which works fine w/o SP2, but as soon as it's installed, we cannot connect to the net (using MSN). Still haven't found a solution, so I'm following the advice above and waiting a month or two to see what Microsoft finds inside this beast...

i downloaded and installed SP2. immediately after i did, the problem of my IE browser having to close when i would go from one site on the net to another was fixed. however, i also began having problems with my connection speeds. occasionally i would connect at 49kbs on my dialup. but most of the time i would connect at 31. should i reinstall sp2? if so, how? and is there a way to solve the problem of dropping my connection speed?

Windows XP should have no real effect on your dialup connection speed. That's more typically a function of the quality of your phone line or any noise thereon.

I took my computer to the shop for some upgrades.
I asked the service tech to install the sp2 cd (I had ordered it from microsoft). He said he installed it from the internet instead....is there any way I can tell if sp2 is installed on my system?

I installed sp2 recently and immediatly after the installation my internet/network access refused to work properly it seemed to cut out as in work for a second then stop, and the worst thing is that fro some reason after i un-installed it, my computer kept the sp2 windows update menu and tries to re-install sp2 every morning at 5am

Installed XP SP2 and it works fine with one exception. I run V-COM's CD Anywhere, a program that creates image files of data CD's and lets you assign the image to any of 23 virtual cd drives. The program no longer works, V-Com has pulled it from the market because MS has no solution. Just spent 1 hour on the MS chat line and they gave up saying it was a 3rd party software and they have no fix.

JUST DOWNLOADED SP2 ON TOSHIBA WITH A YAMAHA AUDIO CARD WINDOWS SP2 WOULD NOT INSTALL THE DRIVERS FOR THE AUDIO CARD.AUDIO CARD DRIVERS WORKED WITH WINDOWS XP BUT NOT WITH SP2 LOADED.CONTACTED MICROSOFT THEY SAID WAS HARDWARE PROBLEM. TRIED TO DOWNLOAD DRIVER FROM YAMAHA BUT WINDOWS WILL NOT INSTALL BECAUSE OF SOME LOGO PROBLEM AND WILL MAKE MY COMPUTER UNSTABLE.CAN SOMEONE HELP PLEASE?

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