I know this is an oft discussed topic here, but I gone through previous posts and haven't found a fix for it yet.

It will open the beginning videos, promo, etc, but crashes immediately upon the main menu. While I was configuring the resolution, however, I found that it could play fine well into the game world--but only when it was presented sideways on screen. How do I fix this to play normally? I've tried everything: opening as Administrator, downloading the DirectX package, checking my graphics driver and finding that it was updated. What am I missing?

My specs: Windows XP, Dell, 1.66Ghz, Intel(R) 965 Family graphics card

Thanks in advance for reading and any help you can offer.

I don't know how I missed this, but this is exactly what the problem turned out to be.
Thank you.

Run nwconfig.exe from your Neverwinter Nights install directory.