Windows Xp more stable then Windows 98 My Foot!

[somebodeez]

Or if it truly is then something is seriously wrong and I am at my wits end

Every single darn time I go to compress my VHS capture to DivX using Virtual Dub, after about 10 -20 minutes into the process, the whole friggin' thing locks up. Can't move the mouse, can't do Ctrl+Alt+Del - nothing.

I have:

Un-installed and re-installed Virtual Dub
Ditto for the video card drivers
"Clean" re-installed XP and put absolutely nothing else on there except for Virtual Dub and my codecs (Divx Pro 502, Huffy and Lame MP3) and drivers for sound card and video card
Deleted mentioned codecs, re-installed them
Tried DivX Pro 501, un-installed that tried DivX Pro 5
Tried using Virtual Dub on the same drive I save movies to
Tried 2 "fixes" for my ATI card from majorgeeks.com (both beta but I was desparate)
Have tried the new version 10 of Virtual Dub as well as the previous version and I can't remember what else else I've done now.

Windows XP (NTFS)
1 Gig Pentium III processor
512 memory
ATI Radeon 8500 DV Video card
C drive is 30 gig
D drive is 80 gig just for my movie files
Using Virtual Dub for both capturing (which goes just fine) and compressing (is when the freezes happens)

Any thoughts on the matter, suggestions ect. greatly appreciated.
If anything, thanks for letting me vent.

[devinemi83]

Try having XP run it in Win98 mode.

[somebodeez]

Thanks so much for your suggestion.
I tried it and unfortunately, still having the same problem.
20 minutes into the compression, it locked up tight .

[Greg12]

Windows update,


If you havent done a Windows Update since u installed XP, their's some patches that expand compatiblity, their was one released in december that fixed 99% of my problems.

[homerpez]

Did you try the NEWEST drivers from ATI? (They just changed their whole driver system, and the drivers are actually good this time around)...

Definitely apply all needed patches from Windows Update, they do make a difference.

[somebodeez]

I feel really dumb
It turns out that my 2 hard drives were too close together, making each other very hot.
I mean, it was like touching my curling iron on it's low setting - that's how hot they were!