If your network adapter has an integrated processor, it can help process some networking functions. This can help free up your main CPU for other tasks and increase performance. However, onboard processing is turned off by default in Windows XP. Here’s a registry hack to make this possible:
Hive: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE
Key: SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\Tcpip\Parameters
Value Name: DisableTaskOffload
DWORD Value: 0 = Use NIC Processor, 1 = Disable NIC Processor
