if i had a penny for every pixel

Get Freespace Open (http://www.fsoinstaller.com/), run the file and choose some mods :p (I'd recommend doing a custom installation). There will be a lot of file options for you to choose from, but I suggest: FreeSpace Open 3.8.0 (whichever of the 6 variants you desire, I tried the Win64 standard version, but the download failed, so I went with Win32 instead), wxLauncher, 2014 FSU MediaVPs and all associated files under it (MV_Assets through MV_CB_ANI_2). The MediaVPS will greatly increase the visual fidelity of the game itself.

Once all that's downloaded, go to wherever you chose to download all this to (I downloaded it all to my Freespace 2 folder, personally) and run the wxlauncher application. This will install wxlauncher and make a wxlauncher folder which will hold a bin and resources folder. Inside the bin folder you should find the wxlauncher application, run that and go to the Basic Settings tab. There you can input your Game root folder location (wherever you installed to) and mess with resolution settings. Make sure you go to the Mods tab and activate MediaVPs 2014 as well if you want the graphically updated stuff. Then, just launch the game through the wxLauncher and you should be good to go!

Instead of the old installer use knossos:
https://www.hard-light.net/forums/index.php?topic=94068.0

It's a new installer/launcher hybrid, much easier to use and is compatible with the GOG backup installer.