system
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Heh, have fun with your little pups then, XP Mode can wait.
The F8 trick - I know it is possible with VMWare since it actually shows entire boot process including POST (virtual BIOS). With Virtual PC/XP Mode, I cannot see anything this early, just a pretty much useless progress bar. I can hit F8 as mad and nothing happens.
(And yeah, it is a free download from MS.)