Windows 2000 Compatibility mode, anyone else using it?

[City Builder]

Hi,
I don't know what causes this but it really makes me not want to play SC4 when it starts happening.  What's going on you ask?

Well... When I play SC4 there are times where the game pauses for anywhere from a few seconds on up to about the count of 30,( you know, one, one thousand, two, one thousand etc).

My only guess on what causes this would be the CPU trying to catch up, but that's my laymens guess and probably has no bearing on the problem.

So anyway, thinking back to when this game was released I think I was still using Windows 98 back then, so I switched to windows 98 compatibility mode to see if that would help any but then the game wouldn't even startup.  I'd see the .tmp file and the simcity4.exe file running in windows xp task manager but it would never actually start the game.  Learning from past experiences when for whatever compatibility mode of win 98 fails, then try win 2000 as it will usually work.

Anyway, so now it's running in windows 2000 compatibility mode and so far so good, but that doesn't actually mean that it's fixed by any means because there are the odd times that the game plays for hours on end without having these frequent pauses so the time that I've tested in 2k compatibility mode may just be one of those times.

Anyway, Im hoping that someone else has experienced this pausing in windows xp with the game and knows how to actually fix it.

Windows XP Pro SP2
AMD 64X2 4600+
2GB Ram (can add 1 more Gig of ram if need be)
SLI Video with dual Nvidia 8800's
Raptor 10k drives
Defragged on a regular basis and done within the past couple days.

[SC4BOY]

Have you installed the "Dual Optimizer" from the AMD web site? This relieves a  lot of "odd little things" which MAY occur in SC4 and other games written prior to multithreading proc's

[City Builder]

Yes, that was one of the things I installed a few months ago when I started to play SC4 again per some suggestions.