first of all grettings fellows.
I found out a solution for that directX 9.0C problem!!!!
I tried every thing written on theses forum (Xept buying a new winXPsp2 )and nothing worked.
I came up with this idea: if the windowed mode didn't work for me (you know the "-w" thing) maybe i could just bypass directX via openGL (er... actually i was a friend that started that but he's not here so ... 8) ). So i just written -openGL in the target of my game icon, and it WORKED (i'm on WoW but like the problem was the same it MIGHT help)!
now that i think of it you can also try -sound, or both.
that's what the it should be like:
Example: "C:\Program Files\World of Warcraft\WoW.exe" -opengl
err ... with "the sims 2" insteed of WoW