Photo Story - Windows Media Player Performance

My PC has an AMD Athlon XP Model A processor running at 2.13 GHz with 512 MB
of RAM. It is running Windows XP with Service Pack 2.



It has a Matrox Millennium G400 DualHead display adapter with 16 MB of RAM
running at a resolution of 1280 by 1024 with 32 bit color quality at 75
Hertz.



The monitor is a 19" Samsung 955DF.



The sound device is a Creative Audio Sound Blaster PCI.



It has Windows Media Player version 10 and Photo Story 3 installed.



The Windows Media Player performance is set to use full video accelaration
with default values.



If I save my Photo Story using Profile for computers - 2 (640x480)
[Recommended if the story is going to be played full screen on a computer
(1.7 GHz processor, 256 MB of RAM or higher). Video size: 640x480] the story
will display fine, smoothly zooming in and out appropriately.



If I save my story using Profile for computers - 3 (800x600) [Recommended if
the story is going to be played full screen on a computer (2.4 GHz
processor, 256 MB of RAM or higher). Video size: 800x600] the story will
display poorly, zooming and transitioning in a jerky, rough manner.



I do not display the Photo Story full screen in Windows Media Player.



The Video Size is set to Fit Player to Video on Start at 100%.



If I wish to play my Photo Stories at 800x600 or 1024x768 is my only
recourse to buy a new PC with a faster processor?



That is, is the performance of a Photo Story displayed in Windows Media
Player essentially processor dependant?