with regards to the hard drive thing, also try keeping your c: drive as much under half full as possible. 2 friends of mine who have taken MCSE classes (& in "the biz" so to speak) have told me that with regards to any win os, the system seems to work better and faster w/ a hard drive less than half full - that is, the drive that the os is installed on. has something to do w/ access times and the swap file that all os's use. if interested in what a swap file is, send me a mail.