Memory Ram

When I had 512MB of RAM, I did a little searching too. These are some of the tweaks that I did. Some of these do change the way Windows looks and sounds a little bit though. I was more interested in freeing up resources though. You could try these and if you don't like it, change it back.

http://mywebpages.comcast.net/SupportCD/OptimizeXP.html
Go to, 'STEP 5 - Tweaks' and then have a look at #1,3,4,5 if you desire space and 6,7 if you want. All this is optional, but this was my first attempt at speeding my system up ever. Since then I have disabled many startup programs like you are doing and then some services.

Not to long ago, I installed another 512MB stick and that is more than plenty with my setup and usage. It was only $37 US. One benefit of adding the RAM which surprised me was my HD wasn't being used as much.

Good luck, innerpeace