Boot Camp: Installing Windows XP

Hello everyone, I wasn't sure if this was the right forum to post this if not could a Mod please move it?

I have a question concerning the installation of the XP OS on a Macbook Pro. I am planning to purchase a Macbook Pro with the intent of installing XP on a partition, here is the OS Newegg.com - Microsoft Windows XP Home SP3 for System Builders - Operating Systems, this is the version I want but it is Service Pack 3 and a customer left a comment stating "Cons: Don't buy this to run a dual OP with your Mac. Though Leopard has BootCamp for the purpose of dual OP's, you have to use service pack 2, and not service pack 3.
This is still unresolved by Apple." This left me questioning whether he was right or wrong and if I could still find a version with SP2.

Any help is greatly appreciated I have many Windows applications I would like to run with my Mac but I need clarification, thank you!

Yes, you need to install XP with SP2, install the Boot Camp update and then install SP3.

If you needed applications aren't that resources intensive or don't require heavy duty graphics card usage, you might want to consider virtualization. What programs are you planning on using?

Thanks dude! good to get that out of the way. As for what programs I will be using I am a big gamer so I virtualization is not much of an option with VMware or Parallels because most games I play are resource intensive. Of course that is not the only reason for XP but I prefer switching between the OS's, thanks again!

You are correct - you will not be able to play those games through virtualization. Try to find a copy of XP SP2. With that, you should be okay.

You can use an XP SP3 disk to install under BC. BC 2.1 is only necessary if you actually install an XP SP2 disk, then you need to install 2.1 (as a Windows executable in Windows) before upgrading to SP3. The disk you found on newegg.com should work fine.

Cheers

I stand corrected. I was under the impression that BC 2.1 had to be installed for SP3 to work. Thanks for clarifying SammySlim.