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Apple, you opened quite a Pandoras box! Now the 5 people with Intel Macs are not happy with the only choice of “Windows XP SP2″, the users want to run XP SP1, XP Media Center, and XP Tablet editions of Microsofts crappy windows.

Thanks to the linkage from Make we found instructions on how to do both.

Instructions after the jump

Windows Media Center

Ingredients – MCE 2005 CD’s from MSDN (or NewEgg or other source), Nero 6, DVD+R, DVD Burner

With thanks to Doug Knox – this was a collaborative effort!

1) Create a Directory on your hard drive named macmce
2) Copy both CD’s to this directory
3) Search for txtsetup.sif in this directory and open it with notepad. Change all %cd2name% to %cdname% (i.e., remove the “2″)

4) Download xpboot.bin from www.dougknox.com/xp/xpboot.zip and extract it from the ZIP file. It does not need to be in the same folder as the files from the ISO’s.

5) Open Nero 6 and create a new DVD-ROM (Boot) compilation.

a) On the Boot tab, select the Image File radio button and point it to the xpboot.bin file you downloaded earlier.
b) Check the box Enable expert settings.
c) For Kind of emulation, select No Emulation.
d) On the boot tab, leave the Load segment of sectors at 07C0.
e) On the boot tab, change the number of loaded sectors to 4.
f) On the Label tab, in the ISO 9660 box enter WB2PFRE_EN

No other changes should be necessary in the New Compilation dialog.

6) Click the New button on the compilation dialog.

7) Drag the files you copied to your hard drive into the left pane of the window.

8) Burn and install!

9) Go to Windows Update and get all the updates until there aren’t any left to install. This puts you at MCE UR2 level.

You’ll need a DVD Decoder and an external USB tuner. I used the Adaptec 3610 Dual Tuner and the software that came with the USB tuner or that you download from the web. The Adaptec came with a CD software. [via]

Windows XP Tablet PC

Actually, the installation process is very similar to that described in the Boot Camp documentation. There are two exceptions, however. For instance, I used a Tablet PC OS Windows XP disc and not the standard Windows XP CD. Apple indicates that Boot Camp does not support this permutation of the OS–if I understand correctly, it’s because the Tablet OS comes on two discs and at install time there is no way to eject a CD and swap to disc two. This problem can be avoided, however, by creating a DVD image that contains all the necessary files (all the files from the Tablet OS disc one and two). I used Nero to burn a bootable DVD from the Tablet PC OS files included in my MSDN subscription. Then when Boot Camp reaches the step where I need to insert a Windows XP install disc in the “CD” drive, I use the DVD instead.

To ensure that the OS installs the Tablet features I plugged in a Wacom digitzing Tablet during the install process. I’d read about some systems hanging if any devices outside of a USB keyboard and mouse were connected to the Mac at the time of Windows installation, but I didn’t run into any problems. Just to be careful, I plugged in the USB digitizer after I saw that the standard device drivers were installed.[via]